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YALE STUDIES IN ENGLISH 
ALBERT S. COOK, Editor 



XXIII 

THE CROSS IN THE LIFE AND 

LITERATURE OF THE 

ANGLO-SAXONS 



BY 

WILLIAM O. STEVENS, Ph.D. 

Instructor in English and Lanv in the United States 
Nanjal Academy 

A Portion of a Thesis presented to the Philosophical Faculty 

of Yale University in Candidacy for the 

Degree of Doctor of Philosophy 




NEW YORK 

HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY 

1904 



.0^ 



^^l^ 



SF-P 16 1904 

CLASS a. XXo. No. 
COPY B 



Copyright, 1904 

by 

WILLIAM O. STEVENS 




Zf^t £ovi> (§a(timoxt (pues 



The Friedeviwald Compant 
Baltimore, Md., U. S. A. 



PREFACE 

The Old English poems, Elene, the Dream of the Rood, 
and the Doomsday Vision in the Christ, express a remark- 
able spirit of veneration for the Cross. The purpose of 
this study is to furnish a setting for these poems with re- 
spect to this devotion to the Cross. It is to find what were 
the ideas of the Cross inherited with Christianity ; how much 
these ideas entered into the life and thought of the Anglo- 
Saxons; whether, in brief, this sentiment must be regarded 
as peculiar to Cynewulf and the poet of the Dream of the 
Rood, or whether it was more or less characteristic of the 
civilization to which these poems belong. It is also to dis- 
cover whether this spirit found expression in forms other 
than poetry, whether it was more predominant at one time 
than another, and to account, if possible, for its existence. 

These questions, and others suggested by them, will be 
taken up in the following pages ; and, in attempting to pro- 
vide a background for the Old English poetry of the Cross, 
I hope that some light may be thrown on the cultural his- 
tory of this early and comparatively obscure period. 

The translations of Old English prose that I have used 
are frequently quoted direct from the versions that ac- 
company the texts in the editions cited. In the case of the 
poetry I have used Garnett's translation of the Elene, Whit- 
man's of the Christ, and the Translations from Old English 
Poetry, edited by Cook and Tinker, which includes a trans- 
lation of the Dream of the Rood by Miss Iddings. 



4 Preface 

In the references to texts and authorities, the abbrevia- 
tions in the foot-notes should be recognized without special 
mention. Where the name of an author only is cited, the 
work is the only work facing his name in the bibliography, 
in the edition there mentioned. Some texts of the Patro- 
logia Latina are reprints from other editions. In these the 
paging of the original is preserved by black-faced numerals. 
As the references in the indices of these volumes is to the 
original rather than to the actual paging, I have followed 
that system here. 



CONTENTS 



PAOB 

Chapter I. Varieties of Cross- Worship -------- 7 

I. The Cross in Legend: (a) The wood of the Cross, p. 8; 
(b) The relics of the True Cross in England, p. 11; (c) 
The Vision of Constantine, p. 12; (d) The Invention of 
the Cross, p. 14; (e) The Exaltation of the Cross, p. 14. 

II. The Cross in the Church: (a) The Church Edifice, p. 15; 
(b) The Altar-Cross, p. 16; (c) The Altar-Cross as a Cru- 
cifix, p. 17; (d) The Crozier as a crucifix, p. 18; (e) The 
Crucifix, p. 19; (f) Ceremonial Honoring of the Cross, p. 
23 ; (g) Private Worship, p. 25 ; (h) The Nature of the 
Adoration, p. 26. 

III. The Sign of the Cross, p. 26: (a) The Sign in Ritual, 
p. 28; (b) As an Oath, p. 32; (c) Other Uses of the 
Cross-Sign in Documents, p. 34; (d) The Cross on 
Coins, p. 35. 

IV. The Cross in Art: (a) The Monogram, p. Z7) (b) Monu- 
mental Crosses, p. 39; i. Pillar Stones, p. 40; 2. Inter- 
laced Crosses, p. 41; 3. Pictorial, p. 43; 4. Date of the 
Interlaced Crosses, p. 44; (c) The Use of the Monu- 
mental Cross; i. Memorial, p. 54; 2. Mortuary, p. 56; 
3. Boundary, p. 57); 4. Sanctuary, p. 58; 5. The Standard 
Cross, p. 58; 6. Oratory Crosses, p. 60; (d) The Cross 
in other Arts, p. 61. 

V. Literary Aspects of the Cross: (a) Theological Mysti- 
cism, p. 63; (b) In Poetry, (i) Latin, p. ()6\ (2) Old 
English, p. 70. Summary, p. 76. 

Chapter II. The Anglo-Saxon Cross in its Historical Setting: 79 
(I) The Influence of Ireland, p. 83. (II) Customs of 
Teutonic Paganism, p. 85. (Ill) The Iconoclastic Con- 
troversy, p. 91. 

Bibliography ----------------- 100 

I. General References, p. 100. II. Latin Texts, p. 102. 
Old English Texts, p. 103. 



Chapter I 

Varieties of Cross- Worship 

The event of supreme importance in the history of the 
worship of the cross as an emblem of the Christian faith 
was the conversion of Constantine, which occurred in the 
year 312. This was the starting-point for all the adoration 
of the cross in the Middle Ages, and the one event which 
at a bound lifted the emblem from disgrace, and crowned 
it with glory and honor. 

Up to that time the cross had been the Christian's re- 
proach. While to him it was associated with the sacrifice 
of his Redeemer, to the world it meant only shame and 
misery. And because, with Paul, he gloried in the cross 
of Christ, he was taunted with being a ' worshiper of the 
cross ' {crude olus) , a term which the Fathers resented and 
repudiated. So, to avoid the charge of staurolatry, and to 
save the symbol of the faith from the sport and malice of 
the pagans, the early Christians as a rule refrained from 
open representations of the cross. Instead, they used em- 
blems, the ' cruces dissimulatse,' such as the letter Chi, the 
anchor, the so-called Swastika cross, and, chief of all, the 
famous Chi Rho monogram. 

But after the vision of the cross in the heavens, and the 
subsequent conversion of the Emperor, the cross needed no 
longer to remain in hiding. Shortly after his conversion 
Constantine forbade magistrates or great land-owners any 
longer to use the cross as an instrument of punishment. 
So, while at first the ideas of ignominy were yet too freshly 
associated with the cross for it to be exalted publicly, and 
the monogram remained the favorite emblem, if came to 
pass that, as actual scenes of crucifixion faded from memory, 
the monogram steadily receded, and the cross came to the 
front. By the time of the conversion of the Anglo-Saxons 



8 The Cross in Legend 

the cross had replaced its former associations of shame by 
those of honor, its praises were sung Hke those of a god, 
and it was ' adored ' by a formal ceremony of the church. 

In the year 597, the missionary band led by Augustine 
landed in Kent, and established the Christian faith once 
more on British soil. Then followed a period of some four 
centuries and a half before the coming of the Normans. 
It is in the remains of this period that we must look for 
the ideas of the cross as they prevailed among the Anglo- 
Saxons. 

Without a minute knowledge of the literature and rituals 
of the Roman, the Gallic, and the British churches it is 
impossible to define the sources for all the Anglo-Saxon 
ideas and practices under this head. But it is possible to 
give the facts as they are found, and to examine them in 
the light of such a general survey of the previous history 
of the Christian church as may be gained from authoritative 
works of reference. We may take as a starting-point the 
legendary history of the cross. 

I. THE CROSS IN LEGEND 

(a) The Wood of the Cross 

The root of the mediaeval legends of the True Cross is in 
the Apocryphal Gospel of Nicodemus. Just after the 
announcement is made in hell that Christ is on his way to 
release the prophets and patriarchs, Seth, at his father's 
bidding, relates the ancient prophecy made to him by the 
archangel Michael (14. 3-8) : 

I, Seth, when I was praying to God at the gates of Paradise, 
beheld the angel of the Lord, Michael, appear to me, saying, I am 
sent unto thee from the Lord ; I am appointed to preside over human 
bodies. I tell thee, Seth, do not pray to God in tears and entreat 
him for the oil of the tree of mercy wherewith to anoint thy father 
Adam for his headache, because thou canst not by any means obtain 
it till the last day and times, namely till five thousand and five 
hundred years be past. Then will Christ, the most merciful Son 
of God, come on earth to raise again the human body of Adam, and 



The Cross in Legend 9 

at the same time to raise the bodies of the dead, and when he 
cometh he will be baptized in Jordan. Then with the oil of mercy 
he will anoint all those who believe on him; and the oil of his mercy 
will continue to future generations, for those who shall be born of 
water and the Holy Ghost unto eternal life. And when at that 
time the most merciful Son of God, Christ Jesus, shall come down 
on earth, he will introduce our father Adam into Paradise, to the 
tree of mercy. 

From this story developed during the Middle Ages a rich 
and varied body of legends, the general tenor of which runs 
as follows : When Adam fell sick unto death, he bade his 
son Seth go to the gate of Paradise and beg for a drop of 
the healing oil from the Tree of Life. But the archangel 
Michael answered Seth with the prophecy of the Messiah, 
and gave him instead a twig (according to some accounts 
a seed, in others three seeds) from the Tree of Life. When 
Adam died, Seth buried him on Golgotha, exactly where the 
cross of Christ was to stand. The seed, or shoot, he planted 
in Jerusalem, where it grew into a great tree. In Solo- 
mon's time it was cut down, on account of its beauty, to be 
used in the building of the temple; but as it proved always 
too short or too long to fit any place whatever, it was re- 
jected, and finally thrown over the brook Kedron for a 
foot-bridge. When the Queen of Sheba visited Solomon 
she refused to set foot upon it, declaring that one day it 
would cause the destruction of the Jews. Accordingly, 
Solomon caused it to be thrown into the pool of Bethesda, 
to the waters of which it imparted healing virtues. Finally, 
at the time of the trial of Christ, the beam came to the sur- 
face, and the Jews took it and made of it at least the up- 
right part of the cross. 

The Gospel of Nicodemus is found in an Old English 
translation, and the story of Seth's visit to Paradise was 
doubtless always familiar. But it is not till the fourteenth 
century that we find this elaborate story developed.^ Dur- 
ing the Anglo-Saxon period there seems to have been no 

^ Morris, Legends of the Holy Rood. 



lo The Cross in Legend 

legend of the wood itself. In the Dream of the Rood, for 
example, there is no hint of the tree planted in Jerusalem, 
cut down by Solomon, and taken from the Pool of Bethesda 
for the Crucifixion. The Rood itself speaks, saying: 

It was long, long ago .... 

Yet I recall, when, at the forest's edge, 

I was hewn down, and from my stem removed.^ 

As to the kind of wood of which the cross was composed, 
there was a wide divergence of opinion. Chrysostom, for 
example, had applied the words of Isaiah : ' The glory of 
Lebanon shall come unto thee, the fir tree, the pine tree and 
the box together, to beautify the place of my sanctuary ; and 
I will make the place of my feet glorious,' ^ to the different 
parts of the cross. And finally, in the Golden Legend, the 
version is given which has survived the rest, namely, that the 
upright part of the cross was of cedar, the cross-beam of 
cypress, the piece on which the feet rested of palm, and 
the slab on which the title was fastened of olive. 

But at the period which we are studying, or at least among 
the Anglo-Saxons, there seems to have been no canon in 
the matter. The quotation from the Dream of the Rood 
just cited shows that the author of that poem did not con- 
ceive of the cross as made of more than one kind of wood. 
(Pseudo. ?) Bede, however, says : 

The cross of the Lord was made of four kinds of wood, which 
are called cypress, cedar, pine, and box. But the box was not in 
the cross unless the tablet was of that wood, which was above 
the brow of Christ, on which the Jews wrote the title, ' Here is the 
King of the Jews.' The cypress was in the earth and even to the 
tablet, the cedar in the transverse, the pine, the upper end.^ 

But he is not quite sure about the box, and in the Riddle 
on the Cross * there is a totally different enumeration. There 
the parts are described as ash or maple,' oak, the ' hard yew ' 

Ml. 28-30. ==60. 13. 

' Patrolog. Lat. 94, Collectanea 555. 

* No. 56. Bihl der A. S. Poesie, Wulcker-Grein. 

^hlin, the meaning of which is doubtful. 



Relics of the Cross ii 

and the ' dark holly.' Evidently the question was still a 
matter for individual speculation. 

In his Book of the Holy Places, Bede speaks of the relic 
of the True Cross preserved at Constantinople as possessing 
a wonderful fragrance : 'A chest containing the relic is laid 
on a golden altar and exposed to view. As long as it re- 
mains open on the altar a marvelous odor spreads through 
the whole church, for an odoriferous liquor like oil flows 
from the knots of the holy wood, the least drop of which 
cures every complaint with which a man may be afflicted.^ 
So, according to the Martyrology, the fragrance is ' a won- 
derful odor, as winsome as if there were collected there all 
kinds of flowers.' ^ ^Ifric, also, in his account of the 
Exaltation of the Cross, dwells on this fragrance of the 
cross : 

There was also another marvel, so that a winsome odor steamed 
from the Holy Cross when it was on its way home throughout 
the land, and filled the air; and the people rejoiced on account of 
their being filled with the odor. No perfume could give out so de- 
lightful a smell.* 

This idea of fragrance may have originated in the lines 
of Fortunatus, 

Funde aroma cortice 
Vincens sapore nectare,* 

but possibly it can be traced back further. 

(b) Relics of the True Cross in England 

In the metrical homily by ^Ifric on the Exaltation of the 
Cross, quoted above, the writer says : ' It is, however, to be 
known that it — the cross — is widely distributed by means of 
frequent sections to every land. But the spiritual significa- 
tion is always with God, ever incorruptible, though the tree 
be cut in pieces.' But there are not many references to 
relics of the True Cross finding their way to England during 

^ Opera, ed. Giles, 4, 440. ^ Mart. 648. 

•^. H. I. 108-13. *'Vexilla Regis' 2. 25-6. 



12 The Vision of Constantine 

the Anglo-Saxon period. In his life of St. Felix, Bede 
relates the havoc made by a conflagration that threatened an 
entire town. While the people were at church praying for 
assistance, Felix went home and, ' taking a small splinter of 
the wood of our Lord's cross, threw it into the midst of the 
fire. Immediately the flames subsided, and the small frag- 
ment of wood effected what so many men with abundance of 
water had not been able to accomplish.' yEthelstan received 
a piece of the cross, enclosed in a crystal, from King Hugh 
of Brittany,^ and Pope Marinus ^ gave a fragment to King 
Alfred. 

The so-called Brussels Cross bears these lines in Old 
English, reminiscent of the Dream of the Rood: 

Rood is my name. Once long ago I bore, 
Trembling, bedewed with blood, the mighty King. 

From this it must be inferred that the wood was regarded 
as a fragment of the True Cross. This wood is bound 
together by strips of silver, as yElfric says the cross was 
adorned by Helena after the Invention.^ 

It is evident, however, that relics of the True Cross had 
not yet become numerous in England during the period 
we are studying, and were regarded as gifts appropriate for 
kings and popes to bestow and receive. 

(c) The Vision of Cotistantine 

But the most popular legends of the cross were those that 
clustered about the vision of Constantine, including the 
stories of the Invention and the Exaltation, which were 
always associated with it. The famous story of the appear- 
ance of the cross in the heavens is connected with the vic- 
tory of Constantine over Maxentius on the 28th of October, 
312. It was the defeat and death of Maxentius upon this 
battle-field that made Constantine Emperor of the West. 
The story of the vision as told by Eusebius, which accord- 

'Wm. Malmesb. p. 397. ^ A.-S. Chron. A. 883. '^. H. 2. 306. 



The Vision of Constantine 13 

ing to his account was related to him by the Emperor him- 
self, and ratified by an oath, is the best known. He says of 
Constantine that — ' about midday, when the sun was begin- 
ning to decline, he saw with his own eyes the trophy of a 
cross of light in the heavens above the sun and bearing the 
inscription, *' Conquer by this." At this sight, he himself 
was struck with amazement, and his whole army also, which 
. . . witnessed the miracle.' ^ 

Lactantius, Rufinus, and Sozomen tell only of a dream 
in which Constantine saw the cross and its accompanying 
inscription. And the Old English poem Elene,^ the anony- 
mous eleventh-century homily on the Invention of the Cross, 
and yElfric's sermon on the Invention,* all tell of the cross as 
appearing in a dream in the early morning rather than as an 
apparition in the sky shortly after midday. The fact that 
these three Old English versions — one of the eighth, and the 
others of the eleventh century — agree in this important vari- 
ation, shows that the accounts which the Anglo-Saxons had 
of the vision of Constantine were not taken directly, at least, 
from Eusebius, but had come from one of the other 
three, Lactantius, Rufinus, or Sozomen. According to 
Professor Cook,* '^Ifric derives his information on the 
subject from Rufinus' version of Eusebius.' It is probable 
that this was also the source for the other two Old English 
accounts.** 

^ Tr. Cook, Christ, p. 90. 

* Morris, Legends of the Holy Rood. 
^Homilies, 2. 302. 

* Christ 19. 

^ Two minor variations may be noted : i. ^Ifric adds a detail 
omitted by the rest: 'He [Constantine] bade then be forged of 

beaten gold a little rood, which he laid on his right hand, fervently 

praying the Almighty Ruler that his right hand might never be 

polluted with the red blood of the Roman people.' 2. There is a 

variation in date between the Elene and the anonymous homily: 

the former sets the year as 233 a. d. ; the latter, 133 years ' after 

Christ's passion and ascension to heaven.' 



14 The Invention and the Exaltation 

(d) The Invention of the Cross 

Closely linked with the legend of the vision of Constan- 
tino is that of the Finding of the True Cross by Helena, 
the mother of the emperor, and that of the Exaltation of the 
Cross, or the restoration of the cross to its place of honor 
in Jerusalem by Heraclius. Both were familiar to the 
Anglo-Saxons. The two most detailed accounts of the 
Invention are Cynewulfs poem Elene, of the eighth cen- 
tury and an anonymous homily of the eleventh, both of 
which have just been quoted among the chief sources of 
the Constantine legend. The Elene tells the story with 
great spirit. The expedition is described as a magnificent 
emprise, the aim of which was to gain the most precious 
object in the world. The whole has a distinctly warlike 
coloring, and suggests an expedition of viking warriors ; 
but the story is the same as that of the well known legend. 
The details of the narrative of the homily vary scarcely at 
all from those of the Elene version.^ 

(e) The Exaltation of the Cross 

The chief account in Old English of the Exaltation is 
^Ifric's homily on that subject.^ In this, the course of the 
story is the same as that of the accepted legend of the 
church. If there be any original contribution to the story 
it is in the elaboration of details, and in the speeches put 
into the mouths of the characters. One is significant enough 
for quotation : 

^ The few may be noted. In the Elene the element of perfume, 
which is dwelt upon by almost all, is omitted. It is * a vapor like 
smoke * which reveals the hiding place of the crosses. In the homily 
it is ' the sweetest smell of all the most precious perfumes.' In the 
Old English Martyrology the brief paragraph under May 3d com- 
bines the smoke and the perfume. " There came up a smoke of 
delightful smell from the ground where the cross was found." 
Again, in the homily, it is a voice from heaven that bids Helena 
forge the nails on her son's bridle; in the Elene it is the advice of 
an elder of Jerusalem. 

^Homilies, 3, 144. 



The Church Edifice 15 

And then the Emperor exclaimed with joy: 'O thou marvelous 
rood on which Christ deigned to suffer, and quench our sins with 
his precious blood ! O thou rood shining more than the stars, 
glorious on this earth! Greatly art thou to be loved, O holy and 
winsome tree that wast worthy to bear the prize of all the earth ! Be 
mindful of this assembly which is here gathered for the honor of 
God!' 

This ardent devotion, as we shall find, was not peculiar to 
^Ifric. 

To review briefly the legend of the cross : We find that 
as yet there was no legend of the tree of the cross, and no 
canon of belief as to the varieties of wood of which the 
cross was composed. But of the history of the cross after 
the crucifixion there is abundant material ; evidently the 
stories of Constantine, Helena, and Heraclius were perfectly 
familiar. The differences in these versions from the older 
stories are of small importance, the greatest variation from 
the accepted legend being the story of the vision of Con- 
stantine, which does not follow the original account of 
Eusebius. 

II. THE CROSS IN THE CHURCH 

(a) The Church Edifice 

The home of the cross was naturally the church. The 
cruciform church edifice had been known from a very early 
period. Indeed, whether the plan was at first consciously 
adopted out of reverence for the symbol of Christ, or 
whether it was the natural modification of the old Roman 
basilica, there are remains of churches of the epoch of 
Constantine which have for their ground-plan the cross. 

Among the Anglo-Saxons, ' all the churches,' says Lin- 
gard, ' mentioned by the most ancient Saxon writers are of a 
square or quadrilateral shape, and were probably built after 
the plan of the basilica at Rome, *' in quadrum " (Bede, 
Hist. 2. 14), " templum quadratum " (Ale. Op. 2. 530). 
But ^thelwold, a monk of the monastery of St. Peter on 
the east coast of Bernicia, who wrote about the year 



i6 The Altar-Cross 

8io, mentions not only a square but a cruciform church, 
the first of that form noticed in our annals (^thel. De 
Abhat. Lind. 120-22).'^ 

But according to another record/ Oswald built his church 
in modum cruets in memory of the victory of Heavenfield, 
and indeed upon the battle-field itself. In this case there was, 
of course, special significance in building the church cruci- 
form, because it was the cross which gave Oswald the vic- 
tory. But if the record is reliable, it shows that the cruci- 
form church was not unknown in the early history of the 
faith among the Anglo-Saxons. Later, however, the prac- 
tice became more common, and remains of cruciform 
churches of our period — for example, that of Stow in Lin- 
colnshire, and that at Dover — exist to this day. But the 
practice did not become conventional till about the time 
of the Crusades. 

After the edifice had been completed, it was consecrated 
throughout by the cross. The bishop marked a cross with 
chrism at various places on the walls, and afterwards on 
these spots crosses were carved or painted, and sometimes 
crosses of metal were affixed. The altar-stone also was 
consecrated at the four corners and at the centre, and at 
these places as well crosses were carved. All this was in 
accordance with a custom of the church which has been 
traced to the fourth century.^ The legend of Edward the 
Confessor tells how Westminster was dedicated by angels 
who ' sprinkled ' and ' marked ' it ' with twelve crosses.' * 

(b) The Altar-Cross 

The cross that held the place of honor within the church 
was that upon the altar. The custom of placing a cross 
upon the altar is very old, though it did not become general 
till the ninth century, and then it was the plain cross, and 

^ Hist, and Antiq. i. 371. 

^ Hist. Church of York, i. 434. 

' This rite is given in detail in the Egbert PontiUcal. 

* Ann. Cambr. 237. 



The Altar-Cross as a Crucifix ly 

not the crucifix. In fact, the plain cross was on the altar 
more often than the crucifix till as late as the sixteenth cen- 
tury/ In the Anglo-Saxon church there was generally, at 
any rate, an altar-cross which either stood upon the altar 
or was suspended over it. It was, in the richer churches at 
least, of the most precious materials, for the cross was the 
symbol of the Redeemer, and as such nothing was too pre- 
cious to lavish upon it.^ 

(c) The Altar-Cross as a Crucifix 

In speaking of the crucifix among the Anglo-Saxons, 
Tlock says : ' Before all and above all other images in their 
estimation was that of the crucifix. The figure of Christ 
was frequently of the purest gold, a masterpiece of work- 
manship, and fastened by four nails to a cross of wood over- 
laid with plates of gold in which were set precious stones.' * 
Now it is noteworthy that in the long prayer oflfered at the 
consecration of the cross in the Egbert Pontifical, while the 
gold, the wood, the crystal, etc., are mentioned, there is no 
reference whatever to a crucified figure. It runs : 

' Radiet hie Unigeniti Filii tui splendor divinitas in auro, 
emicet gloria passionis in ligno, in cruore rutilet nostrge 
mortis redemptio, in splendore cristalli nostrae vitse puri- 
ficatio.' 

The word cruore, by the way, suggests that the cross was 
painted red. This was a very ancient custom in Rome,* 
and it is not unlikely that it was practised in England. 
Aside from the word just referred to, in the charters a 
boundary cross is sometimes mentioned as a * red cross ; ' ' 
the Dream of the Rood * and the Christ '' represent the cross 

^ Seymour, p. 209. 

* For the significance of this ornament, see the prayer quoted 
below. 

' 1. 305. 

* Ebert, Ueher den Traum, etc., p. 83. 
' Earle, Charters, p. 291, No. 909. 

M. 24. M. iioi. 

2 



i8 The Crosier as a Crucifix 

as bloody or red; and some of the ancient consecration- 
crosses have vestiges of red paint/ 

In the same Pontifical is an adoration-ceremony, contain- 
ing a prayer to be said when the cross is adored, and this 
might seem at first glance to indicate that there was a figure 
of the Savior upon the altar-cross : 

Domine Jesu Christe, adoro te in cruce ascendentem, spineam 
coronam in capiti portentem; deprecor te ut ipsa crux liberet me ab 
angelo percutiente. Domine Jesu Christe, adoro te in cruce vulner- 
atum, felle et aceto potatum; deprecor te, ut tua mors sit vita mea. 

But the prayer continues : 

Domine Jesu Christe, adoro te descendentem ad inferos, liberantem 
captivos, . . . ascendentem in caelum, sedentem ad dextram Patris, 
. . . adoro te venturum in judicio, etc., 

showing that these conceptions of Christ have no reference 
to anything upon the actual cross. 

This is confirmed by the fact that all Anglo-Saxon cruci- 
fixes represented the Savior, not with a thorny crown, but 
with the diadem of a king.^ The older tradition generally 
prevailed, representing Christ as ruling in majesty, not suf- 
fering in agony. The ' spineam coronam in capiti por- 
tantem ' of the prayer could not in any case refer to a 
crucifix. Further, an illumination which pictures Cnut 
presenting a great golden jeweled altar-cross to the Abbey 
of New Minster (Hyde Abbey )^ represents this cross as 
without the crucified figure. All this evidence, negative 
and positive, together with the fact that plain altar-crosses, 
rather than crucifixes, prevailed in Christian Europe gen- 
erally till as late as the sixteenth century, makes it almost 
certain that among the Anglo-Saxons the altar-cross was 
always plain. 

(d) The Crozier as a Crucifix 

In speaking of the crozier, or archiepiscopal cross. Rock 
affirms that ' while it is frequently shown in monuments as 

^ Archceologia 48, 456. 

^ Rock I. 306. Note also legend of Dunstan, Vita S. Dunst., Rolls 
Series, 5, 63. p. 113. 
' Palceog. Soc. Facs., Series 2, Vol. i, pi. 16. 



The Crucifix 19 

a mere cross without any kind of image upon it, still we 
have good reasons for believing that not unoften it bore on 
each of its two sides a figure of our Lord hanging " nailed 
to the rood." ' ^ But the ' good reasons ' that he adduces 
are a manuscript drawing of the twelfth century, and a 
grave-brass of the fifteenth. The drawing of Archbishop 
Elga, already referred to, represents him as holding a crozier 
which is plain. Indeed, among all the facsimiles of Anglo- 
Saxon manuscripts that I have seen I have not found a 
single picture of a crucifix, and while there is plenty of 
evidence that crucifixes were known in England before the 
Norman invasion, they were certainly not in use during 
the whole of the Anglo-Saxon period, and it is useful for our 
purpose to make some distinction. 

(e) The CruciHx 

As early as the fifth century there were beginnings of a 
tendency to represent Christ's person without relation to 
the cross. To the early Christian a realistic representation 
of the person of Christ would have savored of idolatry, and 
to represent him crucified, an act of sacrilege. But there 
was evidently a craving for some visible representation of 
the Atonement. At first the Lamb was used as the symbol 
of the Divine Sacrifice, employed in conjunction with 
the cross in a great many varieties of combination,* which 
reached their climax in the eighth and ninth centuries.* 

But long before the eighth century another step had been 
taken. The cross was depicted in union with ideal portraits 
of the Savior, generally as a beautiful youth holding a cross 
in his hands.* In a manuscript of the sixth century a cross 
is drawn with a bust of Christ surmounting the top, and 
similar figures have been found in painting and mosaic' 

^2. 232. 

^Walcott, Sacred Archeology, p. 341; Didron, Christ, Icon. s. v. 
Lamb. ' Ibid. 

* Seymour, p. 158. 
° Jameson, History of Our Lord, p. 320. 



20 The Crucifix 

The transition from this ideal portrait of Christ over the 
cross to the entire figure outstretched and nailed thereon 
is a short one. The earliest picture of the crucifixion comes 
from the Orient ; it is in a Syrian manuscript of the Gospels, 
dating from the year 586.^ Not long after this, Pope Greg- 
ory the Great presented Theodolinda with a cross of gold 
on which the crucifixion is represented in enamel, the work 
of a Greek artist.^ But pictures of the crucifixion were still 
very rare a hundred years after. The council ' Quinisextum 
in Trullo/ of the year 692, gave formal sanction to the 
custom of representing the actual figure of Christ instead 
of the symbolical figure of the Lamb,' but most representa- 
tions of the crucifixion were still in painting or mosaic. 

So, as we have seen, at the time of the mission of Augus- 
tine representations of the crucifixion must have been 
extremely rare, as it was nearly a hundred years after when 
the custom received the formal sanction of the Church. It 
is therefore absurd to call the silver cross that figured in 
the procession of Augustine a crucifix — as Miller does, for 
example, in his translation of Alfred's Bede. The passage 
in the Ecclesiastical History is as follows : 

*B2eron Cristes rode tacen, sylfrene Cristes msl mid him.' 
Here * Cristes rode tacen sylfrene Cristes msel,' translates 
Bede's 'crucem (pro vexillo ferentes) argenteam.' Miller 
translates the Old English thus : ' They bore the emblem 
of Christ's cross — and had a silver crucifix with them' — a 
translation not warranted in the least.* 

The faith was introduced into England before crucifixes 
were known, and when pictures of the crucifixion, even in 
painting or mosaic, were very rare. Still it is too much to 
say, with the writer in the Dictionary of Christian Antiqui- 
ties, that up to the time of Charlemagne ' all representations 
of the crucified form of our Lord alone, as well as pictures, 

* Cutts, Hist. Early Christ. Art, p. 198. 

*Martigny, p. 227. 

' ibid. 

*Bede, Eccles. Hist., E. E. T. S. 95-96, p. 59. 



The Crucifix 21 

reliefs, and mosaics, in which that form is the central object 
of the scene, may be considered alike symbolical, and with- 
out historical realism or artistic appeal to the emotions.' 
Bede ^ mentions among the treasures brought by Benedict 
Biscop from Rome in 678 a painting of the serpent raised 
up by Moses, paralleled by one of the Son of Man * in cruce 
exaltatum.' This is the earliest example of a picture of the 
crucifixion in England that we have ; still it is not a 
crucifix. 

One of the earliest examples of an actual crucifix in west- 
ern Europe is that which Charlemagne presented to Pope 
Leo III, of the date 815.^ But that it was not an object of 
worship in the Gallican church of that time seems clear from 
the tenor of the famous capitularies on the subject of image- 
worship, published by the Emperor some years before. 

The earliest mention of a crucifix in England is one in 
the legend of St. Dunstan,^ belonging therefore to the tenth 
century. But it is not unlikely that after the final victory 
of image-worship in the great iconoclastic controversy, cru- 
cifixes gradually found their way into England during the 
latter part of the ninth century. 

According to Lingard,* after the burning of the Abbey of 
Medeshamstede (Peterborough), and the massacre of the 
monks by the Danes, the victims were buried in one wide 
grave ; on the surface a small pyramid of stone was placed, 
bearing a record of the disaster, and opposite the pyramid, 
to protect the spot from being profaned, a cross was erected 
on which was engraved the image of Christ. As the mas- 
sacre took place in the year 870, it shows that the carving 
of an image upon the face of the cross was already practised 
in the latter part of the ninth century. 

On stone crosses belonging in all probability to the tenth 
century is frequently carved a rude image of the Savior.' 

^ Hist. Abb., Sec. 9, in Op., Hist, ed. Plummer, p. S73- 

^ Diet. Christ. Antiq., p. 514. 

' Vita S. Dunst., auctore Osberno; Rolls Ser. 63, 113. 

* Hist. Antiq., etc., 2. 234. •' 

* Brit. Arch. Journ., 44. 300. i 



22 The Crucifix 

In documents ^ of the late tenth and eleventh centuries there 
are references to the crucifix, showing that by that time it 
had come into general use. In the tomb of Edward the 
Confessor was found a golden crucifix.* 

It is not improbable, as Rock supposes, that the image 
may have been carved on processional and archiepiscopal 
crosses in the tenth and eleventh centuries, though as yet I 
have found no evidence to prove it. But the altar-cross 
continued plain certainly till the Norman Conquest, and 
probably for several centuries after. 

^Ifric makes no allusion to the crucifix, but orders his 
flock to pray to the cross,^ and it is evident that in his day 
the cross was the significant thing, whether or not an image 
was upon it — and it was the cross that was adored. It was 
still, as in its ancient uses, the emblem of the Savior. This 
is further brought out by the Old English words for the 
cross, which wholly ignore the presence of an image. It is 
the ' rod^ — the 'rood' or 'cross'; or the Crlstesm^l, the 
symbol of Christ; a rdde idcn ' rood token'; or * Crlsiestdcn^' 
and so on, not one of the terms having the special 
significance of a crucifix. The word 'Cristesmkl ' is most 
frequently translated ' crucifix,' but for no reason that I can 
discover. The word means only the * symbol of Christ,' 
which is the precise significance of the cross in the early 
church. This word is frequently used to designate the plain 
cross-mark signed at the end of charters * to represent the 
sign of the cross, and, in short, is found over and over again 
where it must mean simply a cross.^ 

In conclusion, we may say that the crucifix was practically 
unknown in England before the ninth century and that it 

^e. g. A. S. Chron. 1070; see also A A. S. Ethelred, A A. SS. Boll. 
Junii 4. 571, and AA. SS. Boll. Junii 2. 329 (Margaret of Scotland). 

^ Archeologia 3, 390. 

^ Canons of ^Ifric, ed. Thorpe, A. S. Laws, p. 449. 

*e. g. A. S. Chron. E. 656, 963. 

" e. g. Oswald's Cross, Alfred's Bede, p. 154; sign of cross, Lchdm. 
2. 294. 



Ceremonials of the Cross 23 

did not come into general use till about a hundred years 
before the Conquest. 

(f) Ceremonial Honoring of the Cross 

The two festivals of the cross, the Exaltation and the 
Invention (September 14 and May 3 respectively), were 
both observed in the Anglo-Saxon church, at least from a 
period which is covered by the Egbert PontiUcial, since 
it contains benedictions for use on those days/ In the Anglo- 
Saxon church these were single feast-days ; later in the 
Sarum use the Invention became a double feast. 

The ceremony of the Adoration of the Cross was cele- 
brated by the Anglo-Saxons, as by the rest of the Christian 
church, on Good Friday. The ceremony is given in full 
by Rock (v. 3, pt. 2, pp. 88 ff.),'' but here we need only the 
opening. In the following quotation I have substituted 
'cross' for 'crucifix' (which Rock uses throughout), for 
reasons already discussed : 

' A muffled cross was held up by two deacons, who stood 
half-way between the choir and the altar. From this spot 
they carried this veiled rood toward the altar, before which 
they laid it down on a pillow. After due time this cross 
was unshrouded by the two deacons, who, in doing so, 
uttered in a low chant " Behold the wood of the Cross." 
Then barefoot, as he and all the other clergy were from the 
very beginning of the day's service, whoever happened to 
be the celebrant, whether bishop, abbot, or priest, came 
forward, and halting thrice on the way vto throw himself 
on the ground, in most lowly wise kissed the cross. After 
him followed the clergy, then the people, to offer this same 
token of homage to their crucified Lord. All the while this 
kissing of the cross was going on, the choir sang the 

' pp. 86, 89. 

^ Also, Concordia 2. 76 fF. (cf. Durand, Rationale 6. yj. 21, 
p. 229) and 182, 184 ff., 385, 665, 735, 833, 870, 895; Durham Ritual 
93. 150. 



24 Ceremonials of the Cross 

anthems — Ecce lignum crucis, Crucem tuam adoramus, Dum 
Fabricator mundi, and the hymn Pange, lingua. 

' It was also the custom of the celebrant to repeat, besides 
the seven penitential psalms, a prayer before the cross. All 
the sacramentaries contain prayers to be said when the 
cross is adored.' 

Following the ceremony of adoration on Good Friday 
was another, which, according to Rock, was ' not insisted on 
for general observance,' but was a rite which might follow 
the prayer of adoration. This ceremony is worth quoting 
because it shows how literally the cross w^as the ' symbol 
of Christ.' In this very simple liturgical drama the cross 
plays the role of Christ's person in the burial and resurrec- 
tion. I quote the description in Fosbroke's British Mona- 
chism:^ 

Because on that day was the burial of our Savior, an image of a 
sepulchre was made on a vacant side of the aUar, and a rail drawn 
around it, where the cross was laid until it should have been wor- 
shiped, . . . The deacon's bearers wrapping it in the places where it 
had been worshiped, i. e., kissed, brought it back to the tomb, sing- 
ing certain psalms, and there laid it with more psalmody. There it 
was watched till the night of Easter Sunday, by two, three, or four 
monks singing psalms. On easter day, the seven canonical hours 
were to be sung in the manner of the canons ; and in the night, be- 
fore matins, the sacrists, because our lord rested in the tomb, were 
to put the cross in its place. Then during a religious service four 
monks robed themselves, one of whom in an alb, as if he had some- 
what to do, came stealingly to the tomb, and there, holding a palm 
branch, sat still till the responsory was ended ; then the three others, 
carrying censers in their hands, came up to him, step by step, as if 
looking for something. As soon as he saw them approach, he began 
singing in a soft voice, 'Whom seek ye?' to which was replied by 
the three others in chorus, ' Jesus of Nazareth.' This was answered 
by the other, ' He is not here, he is risen.' At which words the 
three last, turning to the choir, cried. Alleluia, the Lord is risen.' 
The other then, as if calling them back, sang, * Come and see the 
place,' and then rising, raised the cloth, showed them the place with- 

^ A fairly close translation from the Regularis Concordia Mona- 
chorum ascribed to Dunstan, or with more probability to Ethelwold 
(Anglia 13. 426-428). 



Private Worship 25 

out the cross, and linen cloths in which it was wrapped. Upon this 
they laid down their censers, took the cloths, extended them to show 
that the Lord was risen, and singing an anthem, placed them upon 
the altar. 

(g) Private Worship 

In the Canons of ^Ifric it is written ^ that Christians 
should " pray to the holy rood so that they all greet the rood 
of God with a kiss." But in his sermon on the Invention 
of the Cross, ^If ric says : ' Christian men truly should bow 
to the hallowed rood in the name of Jesus, for although we 
have not that on which he suffered, its likeness is neverthe- 
less holy, to which we can ever bow in our prayers to the 
Mighty Lord who suffered for men ; and the rood is a 
memorial of his great passion, holy through him though it 
grew in a wood. We ever honor it for the honor of Christ, 
who redeemed us with love through it, for which we thank 
him as long as we live.' ^ 

Moreover, it is written in the life of Alcuin ^ that when- 
ever he saw the cross he bowed towards it, whispering these 
words : * * Tuam crucem adoramus, Domine, et tuam glori- 
osam recolimus passionem.' Ceolfrith also, ' worshiped ' 
the cross which accompanied him when he set out from 
Wearmouth for Rome. The deacons of his church went 
with him on board the vessel, carrying lighted tapers and a 
golden cross. When he had reached the other side of the 
river ' he worshiped the cross, then mounted his horse and 
departed.' ° 

It is evident from these examples alone that the worship 
of the cross was not restricted to the ' adoration ' of Good 
Friday, or even to the customary devotion paid to it in the 
church,' but was practised by individuals in private. 

^ A. S. Laws, ed. Thorpe, p. 449. 

'Horn., 2, 306. 

' Vita, etc., Patrolog. Lat. 100. 

* The same prayer is in the Durham Ritual, p. 140. 

' Bede, Hist. Abb. 2. 392, ed. Giles. 

'^Durham Rit., pp. 149-15C. 



26 The Sign of the Cross 

(h) The Nature of the Adoration 

But whatever this adoration may have amounted to in 
practice, in theory it was not a worship of the cross itself, 
^Ifric concludes his sermon for the fifth Sunday in Lent 
thus : ' Through the tree came death to us, since Adam 
ate the forbidden apple; and through the tree came to us 
again life and redemption. In the holy rood-token is our 
blessing, and to the cross we pray, by no means however to 
the tree itself, hut to the Almighty Lord who hung for us on 
the holy rood/ ^ So also Alcuin, who was foremost in hon- 
oring the cross, says : ' We prostrate ourselves bodily before 
the cross, mentally before the Lord ; we venerate the cross 
by which we were redeemed, and we invoke him who re- 
deemed us.' ^ This is clearly indicated by the prayer of the 
Adoration ceremony, already quoted, and the same thing is 
true of all other prayers ' to be said when the cross is 
adored.' The cross was the visible symbol of Christ ; to this 
the worshiper bowed his head, but in the words of his prayer 
he invoked Christ. 

However, it was a distinction difficult to maintain, and, as 
we shall find later, the cross became, probably as a result of 
this adoration, endowed with a personality to the point of 
being deified. In the early days of the faith the Christian 
repudiated the name of ' cross-worshiper,' but at the time 
which we are studying there was no longer reproach in the 
name. Aldhelm, for example, calls himself ' worshiper of 
the cross ' as a synonym for Christian.^ 

III. THE SIGN OF THE CROSS 

The visible, material cross — crux exemplata — was not 
more important in the service of the church and the life of 
the Christian than the cross in its invisible or imaginary 

^Homilies 2. 240. 

^ Patrolog. Lat. 75. 479. 

^ Pref. Liber de Virgin., Patrolog. Lat. 89. 103. Lingard 2. 107 
gives references to the author of the Life of St. Willibald, and one of 
his correspondents, who uses the same term. 



The Sign of the Cross 27 

form, the ' sign of the cross ' or crux usiialis. Long before 
the Christian dared to expose the symbol of his Lord in out- 
ward, visible form, this was his countersign among his 
fellow-disciples, his profession of faith before his enemies, 
and his comfort and resource for every event, from the 
trivial details of daily life to the deepest experiences of joy 
or sorrow. 

The original method of making the sign was to mark a 
cross on the forehead with the thumb or fore-finger/ The 
same mark could also be applied to blessing parts of the 
body or other objects. In the sixth century another method 
had risen into favor, in which the hand was raised to the 
forehead, then drawn down to the heart, then to the left 
shoulder, then to the right.' These were the two chief 
methods — the small cross and the large cross — and there 
were in the making of the latter a variety of methods of 
holding the fingers, with a corresponding variety of sig- 
nifications. 

Both the small and the large cross were known in 
Anglo-Saxon England. In the Egbert Pontifical the sign 
is referred to as made cum pollice or cum digito.^ Alcuin, 
in speaking of the celebration of the Mass, evidently has the 
cross in mind." Boniface says : ^ Habete Christum in corde, 
et signum sanctae crucis in fronte,' " and there are many 
other references to this small cross upon the brow. Accord- 
ing to William of Malmesbury's account of the Life of St. 
Dunstan, this usage persisted in his day ; for, as the saint 
beheld Edgitha making the sign frequently upon her brow, 
he cried, * May that hand never decay ! ' And it was proved 

^Kraus, Realencyl. Christ. Alt. p. p. 252. 
' ibid. 

^ Egbert, Pontif., pp. 36. 40. 

* Patrolog. Lat. 100. 499 : ' Crucem in fronte ponit diaconus, . . . 
deinde in pectore.' 
° Opera, ed. Giles, 2. 97. 



28 The Sign in Ritual 

after her death that the hand that made the sign remained 
uncorrupted/ 

Possibly the long life of this earlier use among the 
Anglo-Saxons was due to the great number of legends with 
which they were familiar which went back to the time 
when the small cross was the only one in use ; and also to 
their adherence to rituals which were probably of very early 
origin. But in the Blickling Homilies Christians are ex- 
horted to bless all their bodies seven times with Christ's 
rood-token.^ In this the reference seems to be to the large 
cross. ^If ric describes this as follows : ' A man may wave 
about wonderfully with his hands without creating any 
blessing, unless he make the sign of the cross. In that case 
the fierce fiend will soon be frightened on account of the 
victorious token. With three fingers one must bless him- 
self for the Holy Trinity.' " 

By the same authority we are told that the sign of the 
cross in its origin goes back to Christ himself ; * therefore, 
since the Savior gave this token to his disciples, it had the 
added dignity of a sacrament. 

(a) The Sign in Ritual 

The idea which underlay the use of the sign in the ritual 
of the church was its power to purify the person or object 
so blessed from the presence of evil spirits. This is brought 

^Zockler, p. 247, refers to this princess as an example of self-in- 
flicted cross-torture, that she scratched the sign of the cross upon 
her forehead an innumerable number of times with her sharp thumb- 
nail. The only reference to anything of the sort whatever is the 
passage mentioned above, wherein I find no hint of anything beyond 
the usual crossing of the forehead. The passage is as follows : 
' Viderat eam sanctus Dunstanus in consecratione basilicae beati 
Dionisii . . , pollicem frequenter dextrum protendere et signum 
crucis fronti a regione pingere.' Wm. Malm., Gesta Pontif., p. 189. 

"p- 47- 

^ Homilies i. 462. 

*ibid. 2. 508. Also Gospel of Nicodemus, ed. Thwaites, p. 17: 
'And se Haelend . . . rode tacen ofer Adam geworhte.' 



The Sign in Ritual 29 

out by what Alcuin and Wulfstan have to say on its use in 
baptism. ' The breast also/ says Alcuin, ' is anointed with 
the same oil, so that the entrance for the devil is closed by 
the sign of the Holy Cross. The shoulder-blades are also 
signed, so that there may be a defense on all sides.' ^ Wulf- 
stan says : ' In the christening that one performs previous 
to baptism there is great significance. When the priest 
christeneth, he breathes on the man, then signs him in 
moduni crticis. After that, through God's might, the devil 
becomes speedily much discouraged.' '^ 

Of the use of the sign in particular rites there is no need 
of discussion here. As far as I can discover, its use in the 
various ceremonies of the Anglo-Saxon church was the 
same as in the Mother Church. It was used a countless 
number of times, giving sanctity and weight to every rite — 
common to all and uniting them all. 

But its usefulness was not confined within the walls of 
the church or monastery. It was the Christian's ready 
weapon for every time of need. Alcuin says, explaining* 
why Christ chose crucifixion rather than some other form 
of death : ' He did not wish to be stoned or cut down by a 
sword, because we should not be able to carry always with 
us stones or a sword with which we should be protected. 
But he chose the cross, which is expressed by an easy move- 
ment of the hand, and with which we may be protected 
against the wiles of the enemy.' ^ 

It was first of all a defense against the assaults of the devil. 
Bede, in his letter to Bishop Egbert, advises him to remind 
his flock ' with what frequent diligence to employ upon 
themselves the sign of our Lord's cross,' * and so to fortify 
themselves and all they have against the continued snares 
of unclean spirits. He recommends it especially as a safe- 
guard against evil thoughts.^ Alcuin says that the first act 

^ Patrolog. Lat. 100. 127. ^ Horn., p. ZZ- 

^ Patrolog. Lat. 75. 428. * Opera, ed. Giles, i. 135. 

^ ibid. 9. 270. 



30 The Sign in Ritual 

upon waking in the morning should be to mark upon the 
Hps the sign of the cross/ Wulfstan says : * Be ever thy 
food and thy rest directed of God and blessed with the holy 
cross.' ^ 

If the sign had not as yet become prescribed in the rite of 
supreme unction, the dying man himself fortified his pass- 
ing spirit by the sign of hope. Bede, in his story of Caed- 
mon's death, tells how the holy man, ' after he had signed 
himself with the sign of the holy cross, laid down his head 
upon the pillow, and fell asleep for awhile, and so in quiet 
ended his life.' ' 

Belief in the efficacy of this sign was supported by a 
great body of legends in which its powers as a talisman are 
most conspicuous.* They point the moral that safety de- 
mands that it should accompany every act of life, and show 
that devils, the forces of nature, and the ills of the flesh, 
are all subject to the wonder-working sign. 

It is only to be expected that, if so many had been healed 
of their ills in the past, the faithful and believing should 
look for its salutary powers for their own benefit in the 
present. So, very naturally, the sign of the cross invaded 
the province of medicine. The position of the church in 
regard to disease and cure by natural means was that dis- 
eases were the work of demons, that mediums are useless 
and contrary to what St. Ambrose declared was 'celestial 
science — watching and prayer.' ^ Among the Anglo-Saxons, 
however, the use of natural remedies was by no means 
despised, as the three volumes of Cockayne's Anglo-Saxon 
Leechdoms testify. Mingled with these natural remedies, 
however, are prescriptions in which theology also has a 

^ Patrolog. Lat. {Lib. de Psalm.) loi. 468. 

^Homilies, p. 250. 

* Eccles. Hist. 4. 24. 

*e. g. Blickl. Horn., p. 243; JElfric, Horn. 3. 170; Alfred's Bede, 
p. 402, et al. 

** Quoted by A. D, White, Hist. Conflict Science and Theology 
2. 26. 



The Sign in Ritual 31 

share, a sort of combination of the powers of earth and 
heaven/ Others are purely rehgious charms, summoning 
the aid of the EvangeHsts, the letters A and Q, and above 
all, the sign of the cross/ 

Of course the demon-theory of disease and misfortune, 
and the method of cure by a charm or fetich, are common 
to all primitive peoples. The pagan Saxons had their for- 
mulas as well as the Christians, and in these Leechdoms are 
found curious mixtures of Christian and pagan fetich. 

There are a few charms in which the cross to be made is 
an actual, material cross. A long charm for bewitched land 
mentions four crosses to be made of aspen.^ This charm 
contains a prayer which is significant in its conception of the 
cross. ' Commend thy prayer,' it runs, ' to the praise and 
glory of Christ and St. Mary, and the Holy Rood.' This 
appears to give the cross a foremost place among the Saints, 
as if it had a sacred personality of its own. This idea of a 
divine personality in the true cross itself is further brought 
out in the charms for bringing back strayed or stolen cattle. 
As the true cross had been lost for centuries, and then dis- 
covered by Helena, it was deemed appropriate to invoke its 
aid in recovering that which was lost. The following is 
one of a group that differs only in unimportant details : 

As soon as anyone says that thy cattle are lost, say first before 
thou say anything else, 

Bethlehem was named the town where Christ was born. 

It is renowned through all the world. 
So may this deed become famous among men, 

Through the Holy Rood of Christ. Amen. 

Then pray thrice toward the east, and say thrice, Crux Christi ah 
oriente reducat; then pray thrice toward the west and say thrice. 
Crux Christi ah occidente reducat; then pray thrice toward the 
south and say thrice, Crux Christi ah austro reducat; then pray 
thrice toward the north and say thrice, Crux Christi ah aquilone 
reducat. Crux Christi ahscondita est et inventa est. The Jews cru- 

^e. g. Lchdm. 2. 350. *e. g. ibid. 2. 140. 

* Lchd. 1. 399. 



32 As an Oath 

cified Christ, they did the worst of deeds, they hid that which they 
could not hide. So may this deed in no wise be hidden, through the 
Holy Rood of Christ. Amen.' ^ 

The most famous, and perhaps the simplest, of these cross- 
charms was the practice of ' touching for the King's evil,' 
which began with Edward the Confessor in 1041. Origin- 
ally this touching was done simply by marking upon the 
sufferer the sign of the cross. 

(b) As an Oath 

It had been a pagan custom to begin all important acts, 
public or private, by a religious ceremony, as, for example, 
a sacrifice. So the Christians for the same acts crossed 
themselves, swore upon relics, and in their legal and eccle- 
siastical documents invoked the name of God. In the fifth 
century began the custom of applying a cross-mark at the 
beginning of documents, in the place of invocations, and at 
the end beside the name of the signer, as a guarantee of 
good faith. This custom must have come to the Anglo- 
Saxons with the introduction of Christianity. 

In this usage the ' sign of the cross ' was, of course, not 
the invisible sign made in the air or upon the body with the 
finger or hand. It was a form in which the crux exemplata 
and the crux usualis seem to have blended. But there seems 
to have been no distinction felt between the marking of a 
cross with ink upon a document or the marking of the 
invisible cross.^ Each was called the signum or vexillum 
cruets, the rode tdcn, or Cristes mcBl. 

The wording to the conclusions to these documents makes 
it clear that the Anglo-Saxon understood its use as a means 
of binding the terms of an agreement by an inviolable oath. 
For example, in a charter of Wihtred's of the year 697 ^ it is 
written : ' This gift the hands of all present confirm with the 

^ Lchd. 3. 60. 

^e. g. Codex Dipl. No. 154, rode tacn. The same word is used 
for the crux usualis, .^Ifric, Horn. 3. 50. 
^ Codex Dipl. i. 49. 



As an Oath 33 

sign of the cross, so that upon him who is so bold as to break 
it contrary to the will of God will come in vengeance the 
cross of Christ, unless he make amends in due order/ 

The method of signing was as follows : After the donor 
had pledged himself by a solemn vow, such as the one just 
quoted, he made the cross, and signed his name immediately 
after it. Then followed the witnesses, each with a cross 
and his name. The churchmen who stood as witnesses 
were generally not content with a simple cross and signa- 
ture, but exercised the greatest ingenuity in devising honor- 
ific expressions for the phrase ' the sign of the cross.' The 
following are a few selected from scores of varieties : ' Sig- 
num mirabile beatae crucis,' Vexillum adorandae crucis,' 
' vexillum sacratissimse crucis,' ' triumphale tropheum agyse 
crucis,' * signaculum almae crucis,' ' and 'signum sanctse sem- 
perque venerandae crucis.' ^ These expressions of them- 
selves suggest the commanding position held by the cross in 
the church of this period. 

On the other hand, nobles who were witnesses were, as 
a rule, quite content to sign themselves simply by the cross. 
This served also as a convenient method of signature for 
kings and nobles who could not write; indeed, from this 
ancient custom the illiterate make their ' mark ' to this day. 
In these signatures the clerk inserted the name after the 
cross was made, and often worked up the cross-mark after- 
ward into a symmetrical figure. In many cases it is evident 
that the cross was drawn beforehand by the clerk, and the 
donor or witness took oath either by tracing his finger or 
pen over the cross already drawn, or by pressing his fingers 
upon it. There are many charters in which, apparently, not 
all the witnesses that were expected were present, as 
there stand a number of crosses with no signature attached.' 
In the following frank acknowledgment of King Wihtred's 
the same custom is seen. He says : "With my own hand I 

^ Codex Dipt. 2. 97, 176, 201. 
*e. g. Codex Dipt. i. 321. 



34 Other Uses in Documents 

press the sign of the holy cross, because of my ignorance of 
letters/ ^ 

In matters of exceptional pomp and circumstance the 
signing of the cross was elaborated into a ceremonial. Ac- 
cording to Rock, ' They took the hand of that personage to 
whom they were about pledging their word for the fulfill- 
ment of each condition in the document, or, if he were away, 
his representative's hand, and upon its open palm they drew 
the sign of the cross with the thumb of their right hand. 
Thus did Offa and Archbishop Lambert with his brother 
bishops, as they all promised the Holy See through Pope 
Adrian's messenger to observe those decrees and canons 
which had been passed under the presidency of that same 
pontifical legate in the first canonical council held at Chalk 
Lythe, in 785.' ' 

This custom of signing documents with the cross, though 
practised throughout the entire Christian world before the 
conversion of the Anglo-Saxons, was given further author- 
ity by the decree of the Anglo-Saxon Church itself. In the 
third council of Chalk Lythe (a. d. 816) it was enacted 
that all documents ' confirmed by the sign of the sacred cross 
of Christ ' were binding and must be fulfilled.^ This cus- 
tom died out in England only with the Norman invasion. 
Under Norman kings the cross was superseded by a wax 
seal. 

(c) Other Uses of the Cross-Sign in Documents 

As already remarked, besides the use of the cross at 
the end of a legal document as an oath, the cross was 
generally placed at the beginning, where it served for 
the invocation,* or sometimes accompanied the invocation.** 
But the cross is found frequently where it is difficult to 

^ibid., p. 49. 

^3, pt. 2, p. 117. Wilkins, Concil 1. 170. 

*Wilkins, Concil. i. 151. 

* Codex Dipl i. 49. 

* Codex Dipl. i. i. . 



The Cross on Coins 35 

find any reason for its being there. It comes sometimes in 
the middle of a charter, and it occurs frequently on the mar- 
gin, especially on a line which contains the name of a king/ 
It appears sometimes in the middle of a word, especially 
* cru+cis,' ^ and always in the middle of the word in the 
sacramentary where a sign of the cross is to be made, as, for 
example, * bene-|-dicere,' ' sancti-[-ficare.' ' It appeared also 
in literary documents, a custom that long survived the Con- 
quest, the manuscript of the Morality Everyman, for 
example, beginning with a cross. In the manuscript of the 
' Nine Herbs Charm,' also, the cross is on the margin on 
a line with the word ' worm,' perhaps for the same reason 
that the writer would have crossed himself at the name of 
the devil. 

Nor was it restricted to writings on parchment; it is 
found preceding inscriptions on stone slabs and crosses, and 
on inscribed rings and jewels.* Apparently in all of these 
the use of the cross is a sort of invocation or ' saying grace,' 
a pious custom without rules or restrictions. Possibly it 
may have been used merely as a sign of good luck. 

(d) The Cross on Coins 

The cross had been stamped on the coins of Christian em- 
perors of Rome from a very early time," and its use in 
Anglo-Saxon England was probably introduced with the 
establishment of the Faith. At all events, it appeared upon 
coins as early as the sceata of Egbert, King of Kent (665 
— 674). These crosses were small and in relief, and there- 
fore are evidently not applied for the purpose of dividing the 
coins into fragments, as was the case with the penny of later 
times. The significance of the cross on Anglo-Saxon coins 

^ Codex Dipt. 2. 296-7. 

* e. g. Egbert, Pontif. 7. 

* e. g. Ihid., 16-17. 

*e. g, Ruthwell Cross, Minster Lovel Jewel. 

' According to Martigny, from the fourth century. 



36 The Cross on Coins 

was doubtless the same as when it was first applied to the 
coins of Roman emperors, namely, that, by its sanctity, it 
pledged the value of the coin. It is akin, therefore, to the 
use of the cross as an oath on legal documents. 

In this connection may be mentioned a few miscellaneous 
forms of oath in which the cross plays a part, though in 
these cases it is not the sign of the cross. Wulfstan swears 
by the cross in a way that is not found elsewhere among 
Anglo-Saxon writers. He says : ' We swear by the great 
power of Almighty God, and by the Holy Rood on which 
Christ sufifered for the salvation of men, that what we say is 
true.' " 

Among the laws for the taking of oaths, we find the fol- 
lowing which mention the cross. Archbishop Egbert sets 
as a test of innocence of an accused person that he ' place 
above his head the cross of the Lord, and testify by the 
Eternal that he is free from guilt.' ^ Another form of oath, 
also, among Egbert's decrees, was to speak the vow with 
hands ' outstretched upon a rood.' ' If an oath not spoken 
upon a cross was broken, the penalty was one-third of the 
penalty if the oath had been sanctified by the cross. In the 
hot-water ordeal, also, the prisoner was required to ' kiss the 
Book and Christ's rood-token.' * 

The idea of the sacredness of the emblem is brought out 
in another way by the making of the sign of the cross in 
posture. The ancient method of prayer, that of standing 
with outstretched arms ' in the likeness of a cross,' was 
transplanted into England, and was used as the most solemn 
form of invocation. Bede tells how Cuthbert, at the re- 
quest of Hereberht, prayed that both might die at the same 
time ; * then the bishop extended himself in the form of 
a cross and prayed, and at once was informed in spirit that 
the Lord had granted the request.' ^ It is related of St. 

^ Horn. J, p. 214. ^Thorpe, A. S. Laws, p. 320. 

^ Ibid., p. 229. * Thorpe, A. S. Laws, p. 96. 

^ Eccles. Hist., p. 372. Plummer. 



The Cross in Art 37 

Ecgburga that, when she wanted to show St. Guthlac how 
strongly she urged him to accept her gift of a leaden coffin 
and a winding sheet, having spoken her wish she stretched 
out her arms as if in prayer — * adjurans per nomen terribile 
supemi Regis, seque ad patibulum Dominicse crucis erigens ' 
— as a sign of her earnest insistence. She instructed her mes- 
senger to deliver her message to Guthlac, and then place 
himself in the position of the cross, as he had seen her do/ 
This custom appears also in one of the charms, which directs 
the sufferer to ' chant henedicite with outstretched arms.' ^ 
Another method was, instead of standing, to kneel with the 
arms extended wide ; and a third was to lie prostrate, with 
the arms extended as before. 

But to stand or kneel in cruce was also a form of penance. 
Among the Canons of Edgar it is directed that the penitent 
' cry to God and implore forgiveness, . . . and kneel fre- 
quently in the sign of the cross.' ' But it was not till the 
eleventh century that we find the custom of laying the dying 
man outstretched upon a cross of ashes, and it was not till 
the Norman invasion that we find this famous mediaeval cus- 
tom to have been generally practised. 

Up to this point we have found little or nothing pecu- 
liarly national in the aspect of cross-worship among the 
Anglo-Saxons, but there yet remain two forms, the pictorial 
arts and literature, which afford a wider opportunity for 
originality than ritual or legend. 

IV. THE CROSS IN ART 

(a) The Monogram 

Before passing to the cross, a word may be said in regard 
to the use of the monogram. The Chi Rho monogram, as 
we have seen, was gradually supplanted by the cross, as 
the need of symbolism, and the actual scenes of crucifixion, 
disappeared. But it was often met with as an accompani- 

^AA. SS. Aprilis 2, 47, q. Rock. ^ Lchdm. i. 400. 

' Thorpe, A. S. Laws, p. 415. 



^8 The Monogra/rn 

ment of the cross, and as one of the symbols of the faith, 
long after it had yielded to the cross. 

In the England of the Anglo-Saxons, the monogram had 
but little meaning. It had already been outgrown by the 
church before Christianity was introduced among them. It 
was doubtless seen in Rome on old monuments, and it 
might easily have been transferred as a mark of the Faith 
upon Christian stones or documents in England. But these 
examples are comparatively rare. The church of Jarrow 
contained a tablet commemorating its original founding, in 
which the inscription is headed by the Chi Rho monogram. 
This event occurred in 686, and it is quite possible that 
Benedict Biscop may have imported the device along with 
the paraphernalia that he brought from Rome. But in the 
earliest documents it is not to be found, and the simple cross 
is used instead. It appears first in a charter dated 770,^ 
taking the place of what might be termed the ' invocation ' 
cross, at the very beginning of the document. It occurs 
only once again in a charter of the years 779,"^ where 
it is combined with the letters a and Q- It occurs 
most frequently, however, in the charters of Edgar, 
in the tenth century. Just why it should have been 
fashionable in clerical circles at that particular time it would 
be difficult to say, unless it was a belated influence of the 
court of Charlemagne. In the time of Charlemagne the 
use of the monogram was revived, through the quickened 
interest in the early history of the Church, a result of that 
revival of letters of which his court was the centre. The 
Chi Rho, with the swastika and a few unimportant devices, 
occurs rarely on the coins of Anglo-Saxon kings.' The 
swastika may have been adopted from Teutonic paganism, 
where, as some say, it stood for the hammer of Thor, the 
so-called hamarsmark. On the other hand, more probably 
it may have come from an early Christian use kept alive in 

^ Codex Dipl. 2. 145. ' Ibid. 164. 

• Catalog Eng. Coins, A. S. Series, Vol. i, plate 47. 



Monumental Crosses 39 

Ireland, as it is seen in some of the Irish illuminations. The 
same device is found also on some of the stone carvings of 
the Anglo-Saxon period, in the so-called ^ Celtic ornament.' * 
But the use of the Chi Rho disappeared in Europe at the 
end of the fifth century,^ and the remains in England — ex- 
cepting, of course, the late revival of its use on manuscripts 
referred to above — belong as a rule to British rather than to 
Anglo-Saxon Christianity. The emblem to which the Anglo- 
Saxons devoted their art was the cross. 

(b) Monumental Crosses 

The most striking feature of the art of the cross — and, 
indeed, of all art among the Anglo-Saxons — is the monu- 
mental cross of stone. 

Monumental crosses had been set up in public places in 
Rome before the mission of Augustine. But for the origin 
of the ornamented stone crosses of the Anglo-Saxon we 
turn, not to Rome, but to the ancient customs of the pagan 
Celts. 

The most exhaustive study of these stone crosses that I 
have found has been made by Mr. J. R. Allen in the pages of 
the British Archceological Journal, and I have followed his 
authority wherever I have been unable to verify his conclu- 
sions for myself. 

According to him, the origin of stone crosses of the 
Anglo-Saxon era may be traced back to the gigantic mono- 
liths of the preceding Celtic period. These rough, unhewn 
obelisks were erected to commemorate chieftains — prob- 
ably such as were slain in battle — and the value of the 
tribute lay in the great size of the stone and the consequent 
difficulty in raising it. 

At a later period, when writing became known, the rough 
pillar was inscribed, in oghams, or in debased Latin charac- 
ters, on a smooth side of the stone. After the introduction 
of Christianity the symbol of the cross was, also, often en- 

*e. g. Calverley, p. 128. 'Martigny s. v. Monogram. 



40 Monumental Crosses 

closed in a circle, the emblem of eternity. From these rude 
Christian monuments developed the graceful and elabo- 
rately ornamented crosses of the later period. The tall 
shaft of these is all that remains of the obelisk, and, crown- 
ing this, the cross, generally coupled with the circle. 

* Some of the oldest of these monuments,' says Allen, 

* are still covered with interlaced work, but without the 
cross. A celebrated example is at Llantwit Major in 
Glamorganshire. . . . The Penrith crosses are a good in- 
stance of pillar-stones, differing very little in outline from 
the pagan monoliths.' ^ 

The remains of the stone monuments which bear the 
cross incised, or are cruciform, may be roughly divided into 
two classes. First, the Pillar-Stones just described, which 
are only removed from the pagan monolith by the incision 
of the cross, but which sometimes bear other Christian 
marks or inscriptions. Secondly, the Interlaced Crosses, 
which are stones carved into the shape of the cross, erected 
upon a base, with more or less elaborate ornament upon the 
sides. Sometimes there is also an inscription, but both the 
lettering of the inscriptions and the details of ornament vary 
according to the locality. Let us examine these two classes 
in detail. 

I. Pillar-Stones. These rude pillar-stones belong to the 
period when paganism was being superseded by Christian- 
ity. They are most common in Ireland; in Wales there 
are a hundred and seven; in Scotland, five; in Dorset, 
Devon, and Cornwall, thirty. Their geographical distribu- 
tion points to their Celtic origin, with Ireland for their 
home. 

The characteristics of this class are as follows. The 
stone is in its natural state, without dressing and without 
ornament. The cross is incised, and of the simplest form, 
generally two lines crossing at right angles, often inclosed 
in a circle. The inscription is in debased Latin capitals, or 

^ Brit Arch. Journ. 34. 353. 



Monumental Crosses 41 

in the Celtic language, in oghams. It is impossible to as- 
sign dates to these, as none of the names inscribed are 
known to history. 

* That these rude pillar-stones belong to the transition 
period between paganism and Christianity is,' says Allen, 
* almost certain, as they are only found either in connec- 
tion with semi-pagan remains or upon the earliest Chris- 
tian sites.' They bear still further evidence of Christian- 
ity : some have the Chi Rho monogram ; some of the 
names mentioned are Scriptural or distinctly Christian ; 
and some of these are specified as church-officers, as bish- 
ops, and as priests; and, finally, Requiescat in Pace, a for- 
mula that is purely Christian, is also found, besides the 
customary Hie Jacet. 

These stones must be regarded as the oldest Christian 
monuments in the British Isles. They belong to a period 
antedating the Christian art of the Anglo-Saxons, and to a 
different race. They stand in an introductory position 
to the more important art of the cross-monument, intro- 
duced later among the Anglo-Saxons by Christian artists 
from Ireland. This is represented in our second division of 
Interlaced Crosses. 

2. Interlaced Crosses. This term is applied by Allen, 
' because,' he says, * the leading feature in the ornament is 
a variety of patterns formed of interlacing hands or cords. 
The characteristics of this class are entirely different from 
those of the rude pillar-stones, and are as follows: i. The 
stone is carefully dressed, and cut out into the shape of a 
cross, and often fixed into a stone socket. 2. There is a 
profusion of ornament of a kind described hereafter, gen- 
erally arranged in panels enclosed in a bead or cable mold- 
ing. 3. The formulas of these inscriptions are more varied, 
and generally to the effect that *'A erected this cross to B ; 
pray for his soul." 4. The language and lettering vary 
with the locality; the language being either Latin, Celtic, 
or Scandinavian, and the letters Irish minuscules and 
oghams (similar to the manuscripts of the same period) or 



42 Monumental Crosses 

the runic letters of Northern Europe.' These crosses are 
found at over i8o different locaHties in Great Britain, vary- 
ing anywhere from two or three to twenty-one feet in 
height. 

The art of these stones is Christian; springing from Ire- 
land, and spreading thence with the diffusion of the faith 
into Wales, Scotland, and England. It was considerably 
modified by the locality to which it was transplanted. For 
example, in the Isle of Man, and parts of Cumberland, Der- 
byshire and Yorkshire, the Celtic styles are mingled with 
Danish.^ In the south of England the Saxon predominates. 

* In purely Irish art,' says Allen,"" ' the geometrical orna- 
ment consists of three separate kinds, namely, spiral-work, 
key-patterns, and interlaced work. Of these, the spiral- 
work is the most typically Celtic, and is copied from the 
British metal work of pre-Christian times, the spiral, with 
expanded trumpet-shaped ends, being unknown outside the 
stones in Ireland and Scotland, and in a few of the manu- 
scripts executed in England and by Irish monks abroad. 
Key-patterns occur on stones in Ireland, Scotland, and 
Wales, and the north of England. Interlaced work is 
found on stones throughout the whole of Great Britain. 

* In Wales and the south of England interlaced work 
predominates; in the north of England interlaced work 
and key-patterns are found in combination ; and in Scot- 
land interlaced work, key-patterns, and spiral are blended 
together in about equal proportions. The Northumbrian 
stones are characterized by scrolls of great beauty. On 
the Scandinavian stones are found scaly dragons and runic 
inscriptions, also patterns formed by interlaced rings. On 
the stones showing Saxon influence the interlaced work is 
badly executed, and in Wales this is also sometimes the 
case.' 

Besides these styles of ornament, there are found also 
symbolical devices — the triquetra, the emblem of the Trin- 

'^ Brit. Arch. Journ. 41. 267. ^ Ibid. 



Monumental Crosses 43 

ity, and the five bosses, representing the five wounds of the 
Saviour; and pictorial representations of men, birds, trees 
and animals, many of which also probably bore a symbolical 
meaning. 

3. Pictorial 

Of the pictorial decorations the most common are the 
crucifixion, hunting scenes, and portraits of the Evangelists. 
In some instances of the crucifixion, as the Halton and 
Burton Crosses,^ the Virgin and John are pictured stand- 
ing on either side of a plain cross. As the custom of rep- 
resenting Christ's person on the cross became general, the 
crosses sometimes became crucifixes, with rude carvings 
of a body, generally clothed in a long tunic, and with arms 
outstretched at right angles to the body. This was almost 
without exception upon the western face of the crosses, in 
accordance with the traditions of the position of Christ on 
the cross. Sometimes, as on some of the Cornish crosses, 
these crucified figures were evidently added at a date later 
than that of the erection of the cross. Another method 
was to insert a picture of the crucifixion-scene in one of 
the panels of ornamentation upon the shaft of the cross. 
In all of these the figure-carving is of the simplest and 
crudest description. 

The most curious feature of the pictorial ornament is the 
representation of warriors and huntsmen on horseback, 
together with stags and hounds. These are found most 
frequently on crosses in Scotland ; they occur in Ire- 
land, but there they are placed more frequently upon the 
base, rather than the shaft of the cross. 

These pictures of the chase appear so often that it is 
believed that they do not refer to contemporary events, or 
the occupation of the person in whose memory the cross 
may have been erected, but that they have a mystic. Chris- 
tian significance, as the chase is repeatedly referred to by 
the Fathers as a commonly accepted symbol of the conver- 

^Calverley, pp. 89, 186. 



44 Monumental Crosses 

sion of sinners/ But the meaning is still a matter of con- 
jecture. 

The Evangelists were held in high honor at this period, 
and on several of the crosses they are portrayed in their 
symbolical characters as part man and part animal. 
These symbolical beasts grow out of the descriptions in the 
visions of Ezekiel and of the Apocalypse, and first appear in 
Christian art in the fifth century."^ It is a curious fact, by 
the way, that while these symbols of the Evangelists appear 
in almost all the Celtic manuscripts of the Gospels, they do 
not appear on any of the crosses of Ireland or Wales. 

There is a figure upon the Halton Cross that is unique, 
and has apparently not the least mystical significance. It is 
a blacksmith working at his forge, with the tools of his trade 
depicted all about him. On the crosses at Leeds, Dum- 
fallandy in Perthshire, and Kirkholm in Wigtonshire, there 
are smith's tools introduced in the ornament. It is not un- 
likely that these served to show the trade of the deceased 
person to whom the memorial cross was erected. This cus- 
tom of carving the tools of the trade upon the tomb or coffin- 
stone goes back to the vaults of the Catacombs, but in Eng- 
land it is not till the Norman period that the custom became 
at all general. 

In addition to the types of picture already mentioned, 
there are figures of men and women, birds, trees, and ani- 
mals, the significance of most of which it is difficult to con- 
jecture; these are impossible to classify. Many of them 
seem to depict scenes of pagan myth intermixed with the 
Christian, a class which will be reserved for discussion 
later. 

4. The Date of the Interlaced Crosses 

Mr. J. R. Allen, from whom we have already quoted 
much, has, in his discussion of the age of the Ilkley Crosses , 
reviewed such evidence concerning the interlaced crosses 

^ Brit. Arch. Journ. 42. 343. ^ Ibid., p. 336. 

^ Brit. Arch. lourn. 46. 341. 



Monumental Crosses 45 

of Great Britain and Ireland as gives any clue to their age, 
and arranged them according to the centuries in which 
they belong. 

According to this table, five crosses belong to the seventh 
century, three to the eighth, while to the ninth belong all 
the crosses of the Isle of Man, two English crosses, two 
Scotch, and several Irish. To the tenth century he as- 
cribes most of the Irish crosses, and to the eleventh and 
twelfth a few unimportant Irish crosses and slabs. 

But this geometrical interlaced ornament, as we have 
already seen, was Irish in its origin, or at least it was so 
developed in Ireland as to gain a thoroughly national char- 
acter. Then it was communicated to the Anglo-Saxons by 
Irish artists. It was used at first for manuscript decoration, 
and reached its perfection about the end of the seventh 
century in such work as that of the Lindisfarne Gospels. 
But the earliest dated stone in Ireland that bears any orna- 
ment whatever of this sort, is the tombstone of an abbot of 
Clonmacnois, who died in 806.^ This has a single Greek fret 
around the cross. In Celtic metal-work there is no trace of 
this ornament before the ninth century, and the famous high 
crosses of Ireland, the best specimens of this kind of art, 
belong, undoubtedly, to the tenth.^ 

It seems strange, therefore, since Ireland was the teacher 
of England in these arts of ornament, that England should 
possess ornate crosses in the seventh century, covered with 
highly elaborated Celtic ornament, when Ireland herself 
had no trace of anything of the sort, either in stone or metal- 
work, before the ninth century, while her best specimens be- 
long to a period a full century later. 

Upon examining the evidence for the dating of the sev- 
enth and eighth century crosses in this list, we find that it 
is based entirely upon the reading of a name upon the cross. 
Granted, first, that the reading is correct (which in con- 

^ Brit. Arch. Journ. 41. 334. ^ Ibid., p. 336. 



46 Monumental Crosses 

spicuous examples, as we shall see, it is not), the archae- 
ologist continues with two other assumptions : first, that 
this name refers to a person of the same, or more often, of 
a similar name known in history ; and, secondly, that this 
cross must have been erected immediately after that per- 
son's death. 

In dating these crosses, Allen follows respectfully, though 
doubtfully, the readings and conjectures of Stephens and 
Haigh. But unfortunately these placed two of the most 
elaborate and finished specimens in the seventh cen- 
tury, namely, the Bewcastle Cross and the Ruthwell 
Cross. Upon the latter, Stephens read the inscription in 
runes, Caedmon me fawed, which he interpreted ' Csedmon 
made me ; ' hence he assigned the cross to the time of Caed- 
mon the poet. On the former he read, ' In the first year 
of the king of this realm Ecgf rith ; ' hence he set for it the 
date 670.^ 

But Professor Cook, having rhade an investigation of the 
verses inscribed on the Ruthwell Cross from the standpoint 
of meaning, metre, diction, and phonology, reaches the con- 
clusion that they must be a quotation from the eighth-cen- 
tury poem. The Dream of the Rood, and gives the entire 
matter of date its final word in his concluding paragraph: 

On the basis of this phonological examination we have found 
that, while the general aspect of the inscription has led many persons 
to refer it to an early period, it lacks some of the marks of an- 
tiquity; every real mark of antiquity can be paralleled from the 
latest documents. . . . We shall not hesitate, I believe, to assume that 
the Ruthwell Inscription is at least as late as the tenth century. If 
now we seek the opinion of an expert, Sophus Miiller, on the orna- 
mentation, ... we shall find it to this effect : " The Ruthwell Cross 
must be posterior to the year 800, and in fact to the Carlovingian 
Renaissance, on account of its decorative features. The free foliage 
and flower-work, and the dragons or monsters with two forelegs, 
wings, and serpents' tails, induce him to believe that it could scarcely 
have been sculptured much before 1000 a. d." Victor has at length 

* It may be remarked that Haigh made out a very different reading. 
ArchcBol. ^liana, q. S. Bugge, p. 93, note. 



Monumental Crosses 47 

proved that the Caedmon me fawed of Stephens' fantasy is non- 
existent, and we are free to accept a conclusion to which archaeology, 
linguistics, and literary scholarship alike impel/ 

The Bewcastle Cross is beyond question a product of ^ the 
same period as the Ruthwell, so that this also may be re- 
moved from the seventh to the end of the tenth century. 
With these may be grouped the Gosforth Cross also,' on ac- 
count of its shape, size, and ornament. This, too, Stephens 
pronounced to be ' probably of seventh century date,' no 
doubt because it evidently belonged to the type of the Ruth- 
well Cross. 

It is of the most importance that, instead of depending 
upon fancy and guesswork, we can determine with good 
reason the approximate date of an important cross hke the 
Ruthwell. With this we can group others which have the 
same characteristics, and thus assign the close of the tenth 
century as an approximate date for the height of the de- 
velopment of the cross-monument in England. This tallies 
well with what we know of the cross-monument in Ireland. 

There are two other guides." First, as stated above, the 
scroll-and-foliage-element was derived from Prankish artists, 
who developed this style in the * Carolingian Renaissance.' 
Secondly, the pictorial element (with the characteristic 
interlaced dragons or serpents) is a product of Scandina- 
vian influence, and dates from the settlement and conver- 
sion of the Danes. These will help a great deal in deter- 
mining the probable age of stones which bear no inscrip- 
tions whatever. 

We have already disposed of the two most notable crosses 
which have been assigned to the seventh century. Let us 
examine the evidence for assigning other interlaced crosses 
to a period preceding the ninth century, when, as already 
noted, the interlaced ornament makes its first appearance 
on stone in Ireland. 

^ ' Notes on the Ruthwell Cross,' Puh. Mod. Lang. Assoc, of 
America, Vol. 17, No. 3. 
^ Bugge, p. 493. ' Calverley, p. 138. 

* West wood, Introd, v-ix; also Arch. Journ. 10. 278 flf. 



48 Monumental Crosses 

The four remaining crosses which Mr. Allen assigns 
to the seventh century are these, denoted by the locality in 
which they are found. All four are in England: one at 
Collingham, dated circa 651; Beckermet, 664; Yarm, 681; 
Hawkeswell, 690. 

Of the Collingham Cross, Allen says, it is ' inscribed in 
runes to the memory of King Oswini, who was ruler of 
the Deira in 651.' Here he follows Stephens,^ who makes 
it out: ' . . . Aeftar Onswini, cu . , . ' and refers it to 
the King Oswini mentioned above. Anything deciphered 
by Stephens from a practically illegible inscription may be 
suspected after his reading of the Ruthwell Cross, to say 
nothing of the assumption of the king in question. But in 
this case the cross as depicted by Stephens has both the 
marks of a late date already mentioned, for the scroll-work 
and interlaced dragons are conspicuous in its ornament 
at the expense of the earlier, purely geometric design. It 
is certain, at all events, that this cross is not earlier than 
the ninth century. 

At Beckermet are two shafts of crosses, ' one of which,' 
continues Mr. Allen, * bears an inscription showing that it 
marks the grave of Bishop Tuda. Bede mentions that 
Tuda, Bishop of Northumbria, died of the plague in A. D. 
664. . . . This cross is, therefore, probably one of the sev- 
enth century.' This reading was given by Rev. D. H. 
Haigh, whom Stephens calls the * learned Mr. Haigh,' "^ an 
archaeologist who could read on the Collingham Cross, for 
example, eight lines of inscription, where even Stephens 
himself could make out only the two words we have already 
quoted. According to Mr. Haigh, the inscription on the 
Beckermet cross reads as follows (translated) : 

Here enclosed 

Tuda Bishop : 

the plague destruction before, 

the reward of Paradise after.' 

"^ Runic Monuments i. 390. ^ Runic Monuments i. 390, note. 

' Calverley, p. 27. 



Monumental Crosses 49 

* This, in conjunction with the story of Bede/ makes it 
seem inevitable that the cross belongs to the seventh cen- 
tury, and that it is, in fact, the burial stone of Bishop Tuda/ 
This ' celebrated reading ' was made in 1857. Two years 
later, Rev. John Maughan announced another reading and 
translation : 

Here beacons 

two set up 

queen Arlec 

for her son Athfeshar 

Pray for our 

souls.^ 

Then, after various attempts by different hands, R. Carr 
Ellison announced his reading in 1866: 

O, thou loved 

offspring Edith, 

little maid 

in slumber waned. 

Years XII. Pray ye for her soul. 

Year MCIII. 

Finally in Calverley' is quoted the most recent version. 
Here the language is supposed to be ' Manx Gaelic,' and 
the author of this reading is a Mr. John Rogers : 

'(This cross was) 

made for 

John mac Cair 

he gone to 

rest in the keeping 
of Christ. Be gracious 
to him, O Christ.' 

At this point the plague-stricken bishop of the seventh 
century has vanished rather completely, together with our 
confidence in any testimony from Mr. Haigh. 

The fragment of a cross at Yarm may be dismissed 

^ Eccles. Hist. Bk. 3, chap. 26-27. 

' ArchcBologia ^liana 6, 61, quoted by Calverley, p. 29. 
'p- 31. 
4 



50 Monumental Crosses 

briefly. It is sufficient to quote the evidence in its favor. 
* It bears an inscription showing that it was erected by 
*' . . . berecht Bishop, in memory of his brother." Pro- 
fessor Earle, of Oxford, reads the name " Hireberecht " ; 
but Professor Stephens makes it " Trumberecht " and iden- 
tifies him with the Bishop of Hexham of that name, A. D. 
68 1.' By similar ' identification ' by the reading of ' St. 
Gacobus ' on the shaft of a cross at Hawkeswell, it is sup- 
posed to commemorate a deacon of St. Paulinus mentioned 
by Bede. This concludes all the evidence for the existence 
of interlaced crosses before the eighth century. 

Of the eighth century there are three, at Alnmouth, 
Harkness, and Thornhill. Of the Alnmouth fragment, 
Stephens gives a description on pages 461-2 of his Runic 
Monuments. All that he can make out is a few meaning- 
less fragments of words, but Mr. Haigh (to quote 
Stephens) ' fills up the words thus,' and get an inscription 
which reads : 

(This is King E)Adulf's th(ruh) (grave-kist) 
(bid) (=pray) (for — the) Soul. 

Myredah me wrought 
Hludwyg me fayed (inscribed). 

^ We have already seen something of Mr. Haigh's work 
at deciphering and ' filling up.' But because the forms of 
the letters on this fragment ' resembles those on the Ruth- 
well Cross,' he feels sure that it can not be later than the be- 
gining of the eighth century! The word Adulf that he 
reads and ' fills up,' he identifies, therefore, as the name of 
a King Aedulf of the early eighth century. This needs no 
comment. 

The Harkness Cross fragments are on the site of an an- 
cient monastery founded by St. Hilda of Whitby. Ac- 
cordingly, on one, Mr. Haigh reads : 

Huaethburga, thy houses always remember thee, most loving 
mother. Blessed Aethilburga ! For ever may they remember thee, 
dutifully mourning! May they ask for thee verdant rest, in the 
name of Christ, venerable mother. 



Monumental Crosses 51 

On another, 

Trecea Bosa, Abbess Aethilburga pray for us. 

These sound characteristic of Mr. Haigh. No. 3 is in- 
scribed with the name ' Bugga.' 

The persons named in this reading, who have been 
* identified,' hved anywhere from the beginning to the end 
of the eighth century. Stephens himself gives these frag- 
ments the dates 700-800. If we accept Haigh's reading, 
it is perfectly reasonable to suppose that the stones 
were erected in the ninth century, after the death of 
the latest of the godly persons mentioned, who are asked 
to pray for the souls of their friends who remain on earth. 
However, there is no reason why we should accept a read- 
ing by Haigh until it has been confirmed by some one else. 

For the two Thornhill fragments ascribed to the eighth 
century, we have to depend again upon the readings of Mr. 
Haigh ."^ Upon one he finds the name Aethuini; on an- 
other, the inscription : * Eadred Isete aefte Eata Inne.' The 
word inne presents difficulty at first, but as it is derived 
probably from innan, ' to enter,' it must mean ' hermit,' i. e., 
a man who enters a cave. This is ' confirmed ' by a pas- 
sage in Simeon of Durham. It is an entry, dated in the 
middle of the eighth century, as follows : ' Eata obiit in 
Craic apud Eboracum.' Of a date some twenty or twenty- 
five years later, there is another entry : ' Etha anachoreta 
feliciter in Cric obiit.' Doubtless if Etha died in Cric or 
Craic, and was an anchorite, Eata, who died in the same 
locality, must have been a hermit too, and probably ' they 
were successive occupants of the same cell.' In the Liher 
Vitae about the middle of the eighth century are the names 
Aethelwini and Eadhelm. The former is undoubtedly the 
same as the Aethwini of one fragment, and Eadhelm ' there 
can be no difficulty in admitting as the full form of Eata.* 
Hence, these stones belong to the eighth century. Still, 

^ Yorkshire Arch. Journ. 4. 426 ff. 



52 Monumental Crosses 

the runes about Eata and Aethwini, Mr. Haigh admits, are 
' not very legible/ 

If we turn from this style of reasoning to the reproduction 
of the stones themselves, we find the ornament on one side 
is a conventional foliage, and on the other an interlaced 
dragonesque design, both of which are accepted as the 
marks of the ornament which, at any rate, belong to a time 
after the Carolingian Renaissance and in the period of 
Scandinavian influence. 

So far we have found no trustworthy evidence for the 
existence of the interlaced cross before the ninth century, 
and there is nothing in the way of what would, at first, 
seem the natural and reasonable supposition that the inter- 
laced cross was a product of Irish influences, and that it 
did not appear in England before the ninth century. 

In our classification of crosses, we have made two divis- 
ions: the Pillar-Stones, with a simple cross incised, and the 
Interlaced Crosses, with their cross-form and wealth of 
ornament. But between these two lies an intermediary 
class, where the monolith develops into the cruciform shape, 
and is sometimes adorned with simple ornament. The 
cross-fragment in Calverley, on page 8i, another on page 6, 
and a third on page 96, are probably examples of this class, 
and there are a great many of them in Western Cornwall. 
But they are unimportant for our consideration here, as 
they simply bridge the step between the rude Pillar-Stones 
and the Interlaced Crosses. 

To contrast the plain incised cross upon the original pil- 
lar-stone with the elaborate ornament which adorned the 
interlaced cross at the height of its development, I subjoin 
Calverley's description ^ of the cross-column at Bewcastle : 

The details are: west face near the top, remains of runes over an 
oblong square-headed panel, containing the figure of S. John Baptist 
bearing the nimbed Agnus Dei. Beneath this panel and over a much 
larger central, oblong, circular-headed panel, are two lines of runes, 
the upper line beginning with the sign of the cross and reading 



' p. 39- 



Monumental Crosses 53 

Gessus (Jesus), the lower one reading Kristus (Christ), This cen- 
tral panel contains the glorified figure of the great Christ, robed as 
a priest, bearing in His left hand the sacred roll. His right hand 
uplifted to bless, treading upon the lion and adder, and His holy 
head leaning slightly to the right hand surrounded with the circling 
halo. Below this central figure comes the principal inscription in 
nine lines of runes. Beneath this, in a wide, circular-headed panel, 
standing a little sideways, and looking toward the spectator's right 
hand, is a man holding on his left wrist his hawk, which has flown 
up from its perch beneath . . . These three figures are the only 
human representations on the cross. , . . 

The details of the south face are : at the bottom an intertwined 
knot-ornament ; above this a line of runes beginning with the sign of 
the cross ; above this a very beautiful piece of double-scroll work, 
consisting of two grape-bearing vines with foliage and clusters, fill- 
ing an oblong panel. Another line of runes appear above, and a 
smaller panel of knot-work above this, surmounted again by a panel 
filled with a single vine-scroll, bearing near the center an early sun- 
dial, whose principal time divisions are marked by a cross, and hav- 
ing rich fruit above. Another line of runes separates this panel from 
a third carving of knot-work, which with some more runes brings 
us to the top of the cross shaft. 

The north face has also five panels. The central and largest 
panel, filled with chequers only, has above and below it and sepa- 
rated by a line of runes, a smaller panel, containing very elegant 
knot-work presenting elaborate specimens of the sacred sign of 
the Holy Trinity, the triquetra so constantly used in the early manu- 
scripts. In the lowest compartment on this side are two conven- 
tional flower and fruit-bearing vine-scrolls of perfect design and ex- 
quisite workmanship, more nobly conceived than perhaps anything 
of the kind which is known in the land. The uppermost compart- 
ment contains a single such scroll. The two divisions — at the top 
and bottom of this side — containing these three Paradise Trees are 
separated from the knot-work divisions each by a line of runes. 
At the very top, preceded by three crosses, is another line of runes — 
Gessus (Jesus). ... It will thus be seen that the chief face of the 
stone bears three sculptured figures, the central one being the 
Christ; that each of the two parallel sides show three divisions of 
interlaced work or geometrical design, and three conventional 
flower and fruit-bearing vines ; and that the knot-work displays in 
various ways the sign of the Trinity. 

The east face of the cross is filled with one great vine-scroll 
rising bodily from below and bearing many fruits which are being 
eaten by beasts and birds. A hound or fox devours a cluster near 



54 T^he Use of the Monumental Cross 

the ground, further up are two creatures of conventional character, 
and higher still two birds, hawk or eagle, and raven, while the two 
topmost fruits are nibbled by two squirrels. 

During the eleventh century the interlaced cross declined, 
and perhaps in the profusion and mixture of all sorts of 
details in such a cross as described above may be seen the 
beginnings of the decline. The elaborate interlaced design 
of Ireland was never executed by Anglo-Saxon artists with 
the same skill as by the Irish. They were content to give 
the suggestion of interlacing, without the careful and con- 
scientious carving of the Irish artists. It must be admitted 
that the Anglo-Saxons appear to have contributed nothing 
whatever to the development of artistic ornament upon the 
cross. 

(c) The Use of the Monumental Cross 

But the question of chief importance, perhaps, in connec- 
tion with these stone crosses, is the part that they played 
in the life of the people. 

I. Memorial. The ancient pagan monoliths that have 
been described were memorials erected in honor of some 
departed hero; and in the earliest Christian forms, the pil- 
lar-stone, with its cross and circle and simple inscription, 
served the same purpose. These stones, as already noted, 
belong to a Celtic area. With the retreat of the British dis- 
appeared the custom of erecting a tomb-cross over a grave. 
In Ireland, according to the Tripartite Life of St. Patrick]^ 
it seems to have been the custom to raise the cross over the 
grave of every Christian ; but in Anglo-Saxon England 
the horizontal slab was used instead, and it was not till the 
tenth century that the headstone cross was employed.^ 

But there were crosses erected to the memory of a saint, 
friend, or relative, which were not placed at the grave. The 
cross commemorative of Owen, the shaft of which is now in 
Ely Cathedral, is an example. It bears the simple inscrip- 
tion, * Lucent tuam Ovino da Deus et requiem.' 

'p. 325. 

^ Cutts' Manual for the Study of Sepulchral Slabs, p. 48. 



The Use of the Monumental Cross 55 

Of a rather different class of memorial crosses are the 
following examples. In the life of St. Columba it is 
related that Ernan, an aged priest, tried to see Columba 
before he died, but while on his way fell upon the ground, 
and expired before fulfilling his desire : ' Hence on that 
spot before the door of the kiln, a cross was raised, and 
another cross was in like manner put up where the saint 
resided at the time of his death, which remaineth to this 
day.' ' 

In the story that Malmesbury tells of the burial of Aid- 
helm is a similar use. The saint had died at the distance 
of fifty miles from Glastonbury, and as the funeral pro- 
cession set out for Glastonbury, where he was to be buried, 
at each stage of seven miles where the body rested, a cross 
was afterwards erected. At these crosses the sick were 
healed, and all seven of them, says the chronicler, were 
standing in his day, and were called ' bis^hop stones.' ^ 

Simeon of Durham * mentions a stone cross erected by 
Bishop Ethelwold at Lindisfarne in memory of Cuthbert. 
Its top was broken off by the Danes when they pillaged 
Lindisfarne, but afterwards the broken part was fastened 
on with lead, and thereafter the cross was always carried 
about with the body of Cuthbert whenever it was moved. 
It came to be venerated by the Northumbrians in memory 
of Ethelwold and Cuthbert together. The writer says of 
the cross that * to this day, standing on high in the cemetery 
of Durham minster, it shows to all who gaze upon it a 
memorial of both these pontiffs.' 

Crosses were sometimes raised in memory of some great 
event. After Oswald's victory, the cross of wood remained 
upright upon the battle-field, and later a stone cross took its 
place. According to Lingard,* after the burning of the 
Abbey of Medeshamstede (Peterborough) and the mas- 
sacre of the monks by the Danes, the victims were buried 

^ Adamnan, p. 38. * Opera, Rolls Series i. 

* Gesta Pontif., p. 383. * Hist, and Antiq. 2. 234. 



56 The Use of the Monumental Cross 

in one wide grave; on the surface, a small pyramid of 
stone was placed, bearing a record of the disaster, and 
opposite the pyramid, to protect the spot from being pro- 
faned, a cross, on which was engraved the image of Christ. 

It should be added, however, that many of the crosses 
which are described as marking the site of a battle, or of a 
church council, are so described through a local tradition, or 
more often on pure supposition. Still, while genuine re- 
mains are rare, there is no doubt that the custom was 
known and practised. 

2. Mortuary. Although the Anglo-Saxons did not place 
the head-stone cross on the grave till the tenth century, they 
were accustomed from a much earlier time to erect a cross 
in the churchyard. This was a custom of Christian Rome,^ 
and was doubtless introduced by the Roman missionaries. 
At the consecration of the cemetery, this cross was erected, 
together with smaller ones at each of the four corners of the 
plot, corresponding to the points of the compass, to mark the 
boundaries. In the consecration service, the bishop began 
by making the circuit of the grounds with his clergy, chant- 
ing the litany. Then he read a portion of the service at the 
eastern cross, did the same at the southern, western, and 
northern crosses, and concluded at the cross in the centre.^ 

Although in the earlier period no crosses stood over 
individual graves, the stone slabs or the stone coffins in 
which the richer were buried were marked with the em- 
blem of the Christian's hope. There were also small square 
stones called ' pillow stones,' which lay under the head of 
the deceased, and bore carved upon their surface the same 
emblem." Some of these slabs show by their ornament that 
they are contemporary with the interlaced crosses. Others 
have no trace of it, and are probably earlier. Many of the 
interlaced crosses which remain to this day were probably 
graveyard crosses, as they are often found near the sites 
of Anglo-Saxon churches. 

* Schaff-Herzog, * Kreuz.' 

*Lingard, Hist. Anfiq. 2. 252, note. ^ ArchcBologia 26. 480. 



The Use of the Monumental Cross 57 

Some miscellaneous crosses connected with burial may 
be included here. According to Rock/ a cross and a book 
of the Gospels were laid across the body to preserve it from 
the attack of demons. Frequently buried with the corpse 
was a cross which, according to the same authority, was 
" generally of wood, with a sheathing of gilt metal.' " 
King Edward the Confessor was buried with a golden cru- 
cifix.^ 

I have met but one instance of the so-called ' cross of 
absolution ; ' this was found in the tomb of Saint Birinus.* 

3. Boundary. In the crosses of the graveyard, we noted 
four small crosses marking the limits of the ground. These 
were ' boundary crosses.' There are references in the terms 
contained in charters to various boundary crosses, in which 
they are referred to as a ' gilded cross,' a ' wooden cross,' 
a * stone cross,' a ' red cross,' and sometimes merely a 
* Christ symbol.' ° These served to mark the limits of 
church property. 

So the monks of Edmundsbury ® erected four crosses, one 
at each extremity of the town, to define the limits of their 
authority, and Bishop Losinga ^ raised a cross at Norwich 
to serve as a boundary mark between the land of the church 
and the borough. St. Guthlac also set up a cross at Croy- 
land as a boundary mark. 

There is an Irish canon of the eighth century which 
directs that a cross should be set up on all consecrated 
grounds, not only to mark the bounds, but also to sanc- 
tify the spot. A few centuries later, in England, a law had 
to be passed forbidding men to set up a cross falsely upon 
their lands in order to pass them off as church property, 
and so evade taxation.* 

To these boundary stones of the church land, the so- 

^2. 312. *Lingard 2, 50. 

' Archeuol. 3, 390. *Rock i. 173, note. 

• e. g. Earle, Handbook, p. 29 ; Codex Dipl. 2. 287. 

•Dugdale, Monasticon 3. 99. 

^ Ibid. * Seymour, p. 321, 



58 The Use of the Monumental Cross 

called ' Rogations ' were made. The Rogation Days were 
the seventh of the calends of May/ and the three 
days before Ascension Day. In these Rogations, the 
clergy and all the parish walked in procession with candles 
and crosses, laid earth and grass upon the boundary stones, 
and offered prayers to avert pestilence. 

4. Sanctuary. In the Irish canon quoted above, the cross 
served not only to mark the boundary but also to conse- 
crate the land. It was so sacred an emblem that none 
would dare remove it as a landmark, and it made the 
ground upon which it stood holy. Hence it became a mark 
of sanctuary. Some churches, out of special reverence for 
the saints whose bones they possessed, had a peculiar privi- 
lege of sanctuary. 'A chair of stone, called the Frid, or 
Frith stool, was sometimes set near the shrine of certain 
saints, or the high altar ; the churches of York, Hexham, 
and Beverley enjoyed this privilege, and in the last 
two these stools are still preserved. The rights of the 
Frith stool overshadowed the region for the distance of a 
mile, and guarded to the refugee the widest privilege be- 
longing by charter to this sanctuary, as long as he chose to 
remain within bounds. Crosses marked the limits of 
safety. . . . This custom is noticed in the dying wish of St. 
Cuthbert, who desired to be buried at Fame, lest if buried 
at Lindisfarne his grave might become a place of refuge for 
runaways.' ^ 

The fugitive who got within the protection of these sanc- 
tuary crosses was given a black robe with a yellow cross 
on his shoulder, in token of the shelter the symbol had given 
him.' The crosses themselves stood very high, so that the 
fugitive could see them from afar, and be guided to safety. 

5. The Standard Cross. Probably the earliest use of the 
monumental cross in Anglo-Saxon England was that as a 
standard of the faith, and a centre for preaching the Gos- 

^ Canons of St. Cuthbert (747 A. D.) at Cloveshoe; q. ibid. p. 322. 
'Rock 3, part i, p. 365. 
* Seymour, p. 220. 



The Use of the Monumenfal Cross 59 

pel. The custom was practised in the conversion of the 
Britons, and continued many centuries. When St. Botulf 
went to found his monastery in the wilderness of Lincoln- 
shire at about the middle of the seventh century, ' he and 
his companions, before they did anything else, planted the 
standard of the cross, and set up the ensign of heavenly 
peace in the cross of Christ.' ^ In the Hfe of St. Willibald 
it is written that ' it was the ancient custom of the Saxon 
nation, on the estate of some of their nobles and great men 
to erect, not a church, but the sign of the Holy Cross, dedi- 
cated to God, beautifully and honorably adorned, and erected 
on high for the common use of daily prayer.' ^ Some of 
the crosses that remain to this day give evidence of serving 
as a place of general worship, with a bowl hollowed out of a 
stone upon the base for holding the sacred water, the re- 
mainder of the stone serving in all probability for an altar.' 

This custom of raising the standard cross was doubtless 
introduced from Rome, and practised by missionaries of the 
faith generally. For example, Boniface complained of a 
Gallic bishop, Adalbert, who went about among the Franks, 
and ' seduced them with divers falsehoods, so that by setting 
up crosses in the fields and pulpits, he made all the people 
come together thither and forsake the public churches.' * 
Naturally, in order to attract the most attention and draw 
the largest crowd, the missionary selected for planting the 
cross the places of resort and the most conspicuous situa- 
tions. So crosses became frequently associated with wells 
and markets. 

These first crosses set up by the missionaries were doubt- 
less crude and frail, but later, especially where there was 
no church built and the cross had to serve for a place of 
worship, permanent and highly decorated stones were set 
up for the purpose. These early standard crosses served 
also to consecrate the ground for the site of the church 

^ Ecclesiologist 8, 228. * Cutts, Parish Priests, p. 24. 

'Ibid. * Boniface, Opera i. 117; cf. p. 122. 



6o The Use of the Monumental Cross 

(according to the custom in the early church of Rome), 
whenever a church was built beside it to take its place as 
a centre of worship. 

6. Oratory Crosses. Nor was the cross merely for pub- 
lic worship and the preaching of the Word; it was also a 
shrine for private supplication. On the highways and at 
cross-roads, especially in Cornwall, crosses were erected 
for the benefit of travelers. Some, evidently, were for the 
purpose of getting the prayers of wayfarers for the soul of 
the deceased to whom the cross was erected as a memorial, 
or for the one who erected the cross himself. For example, 
one cross is inscribed, 

Alcne prepared this cross for his soul.^ 
Other stones served for an entire family ; for example, 

E. and G. wrought this family stone for ^Ifric's soul and for 
themselves.^ 

These oratory crosses were erected, evidently, as a work 
of merit. 

However, the divisions that we have followed are 
arbitrary at best. Almost any one of the crosses might 
have the functions of any or all of the rest, and there is 
no doubt that many of them served more purposes than 
one.' 

The larger of these crosses were generally set up on 
three steps, symbolical of the Trinity, on which worship- 
ers might kneel. The side of the cross which had the 
symbol of Christ incised, or bore the image carved, faced 
the west, with arms pointing north and south. Thus the 
worshiper turned his face to the east, and the ancient tra- 
ditions of the position of Christ in the crucifixion were also 
preserved. 

After the Norman conquest these stone crosses were 

^Brit. Arch. Journ. 42. 313. 
^ Brit. Arch. Journ. 42. 313. 

' e. g. the memorial cross of Cuthbert became a graveyard cross at 
Durham. See above. 



The Cross in Other Arts 6l 

broken up and used for building material, whenever they 
were conveniently to hand. The survivors of this Norman 
ruthlessness had to suffer, beside the ordinary ravages of 
time, the iconoclastic zeal of the Puritans, so that it is a 
marvel that so many beautiful examples of the Anglo-Saxon 
cross-monument exist to-day/ 

(d) The Cross in Other Arts 

Before concluding this discussion of the cross in Anglo- 
Saxon art, we should give at least a passing mention to 
the arts of illumination and of jewelry. 

Naturally, the cross was constantly employed as a motive 
in the designs of the illuminated page. It appears constantly, 
now conspicuously, now in all sorts of disguises. Sometimes 
it is used merely in the border of a picture, and again it occu- 
pies the full space of the design. Of the latter, a most beau- 
tiful example is that given in a facsimile in Plate 12 of West- 
wood's Irish and Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts, a page taken 
from one of the most beautiful illuminations ever done in 
England, the Lindisfarne Gospels. It is wholly Celtic in 
character, and probably was done by Irish artists; at any 
rate, it came from an ancient seat of Irish culture. 

According to the facsimiles which I have examined, the 
picture of the crucifixion on manuscripts belong to a late 
period, either the end of the tenth or the eleventh 
century. An Irish manuscript of the ninth century pictures 
the Crucified swathed in a conventional garment from head 
to foot, following the older style of the full tunic, with head 
erect and arms at right angles to the body.^ Further, the 
wound is on the left side. 

In the later Anglo-Saxon illuminations, however, a newer 
style is seen; the head inclines slightly to the right, the 
body is clothed only in a short tunic extending from the 
waist to the knee. The wound is on the right side, and the 

^ For a list of interlaced stone remains, compiled by J. R. Allen 
and G. F. Browne, see Brit. Arch. Journ. 41. 351. 
* Westwood, Irish and A.-S. MSS. 



62 The Cross in Other Arts 

arms are not stretched in a perfectly straight line from the 
shoulders. In all of these Christ is alive, though wounded ; 
indeed, the early idea seems to have been that his wound 
was made before death, and, in fact, was the cause of 
death/ He does not wear a crown of thorns, but has 
always a halo, which is sometimes cruciform. 

The custom of representing the Savior as dead was a 
later fashion, imported from the East. Kraus ^ cites, as 
a first example in Europe, a manuscript belonging to the 
year 1060. But in Westwood's collection ^ is a facsimile 
of a dead Christ upon the cross in an Anglo-Saxon manu- 
script attributed by him to the end of the tenth century. 
However, this custom was not generally followed for some 
two or three hundred years afterwards, when the transi- 
tion from symbolism to realism had become complete. 

Of the cross in jewelry little need be said. The cross in- 
variably appears on rings with inscriptions, as the cross 
always accompanied inscriptions. It occurs also on a talis- 
manic ring with a runic charm, perhaps with an added use- 
fulness for good luck. But it was also employed for deco- 
rative purposes, notably in the ' Minster Lovell Jewel.' * 
It " appeared also on the base of drinking bowls, and the like. 
The cruciform fibulas that belong to the Anglo-Saxon 
period seem to me of no significance in this connection, be- 
cause the fibulae of pagan times were often of the same 
shape. 

Although the remains of the Anglo-Saxon goldsmith's 
art are scanty at best, it is interesting for our purpose to see 
that, few as they are, they also reflect the veneration for 
the cross. 

^^Ifric, Horn. 1. 216; Christ 1447 ff. 
^ Realencycl. der Christ. Alter th. p. p. 240. 
' Plate 43. 

*For excellent facsimiles of Anglo-Saxon jewelry, see the Anglo- 
Saxon Review, Dec, 1900, p. 170; June, 1900, p. 755. 
^ ArchcBologia 50, pt. 2, p. 406. 



Literary Aspects of the Cross 63 

V. LITERARY ASPECTS OF THE CROSS 

{a) Theological Mysticism 

The custom of searching for allegorical and prophetic 
types in Scripture was zealously practised by Anglo- 
Saxon scholars, especially by Bede. The birth of Eve from 
the side of the sleeping Adam symbolized the birth of the 
Bride — i. e., the Church — from the pierced side of Christ 
as he slept the sleep of death/ Noah's drunkenness, curi- 
ously enough, was a prophecy of the crucifixion, and the 
laughter of Ham prefigured the taunts of the Jews/ Cain, 
leading Abel out to slay him, was a prophecy of the Jews' 
leading Christ outside the city, and all the details of the 
murder of Abel are made to correspond with the details of 
the crucifixion/ Mount Tabor suggested the cross, be- 
cause the name is interpreted as * coming light,' and there- 
fore * by name and position is pleasing to the mysteries of 
the life-giving cross.' * 

Of the direct references to the cross there are a great 
many; only a few characteristic ones need be quoted here. 
First, as to the wood of the cross. The association of the 
tree of life with the cross is found all through the Anglo- 
Saxon literature of the cross, and also in the sacramenta- 
ries. Bede, in his hymn on the passion of St. Andrew, 
says of his being raised upon the cross : ' Levatur in vitae 
arborem.' ° In the Benedictional of Ethelwold it is writ- 
ten : ' Deus noster vos perducat ad arborem vitae, qui eruit 
de lacu myseriae, ipse vobis aperiat ianuam paradysi qui 
congregit portes inferni. Amen.' 

But the tree of knowledge of good and evil is also par- 
alleled with the cross. Bede expounds the words, ' the cool 
of the day' (Genesis 3. 8) as follows: 'Doubtless in the 
same hour in which the first man touched the tree of pre- 

'Bede i. 79. ^ Ihid. 7. 126. "" Ibid. 7. 75. 

*Ibid. 8. 22. ^Ibid. i. 97. 



64 Types of the Cross 

varication, the second man ascended the tree of redemp- 
tion, and that hour of the day which expelled the prevari- 
cators from Paradise led the Confessor to Paradise/ ^ 

The parallelism of the cross on the shoulders of Christ 
with the fagots borne by Isaac was brought out in the pic- 
tures brought by Benedict to adorn his church at Wear- 
mouth/ The ark was a favorite type of the cross. The 
smiting of the rock in the Wilderness signified the Pas- 
sion, for the rock represented Christ ; the rod, the cross ; 
and Moses and Aaron, the chief priests and the doctors of 
law. David's feigned madness signified the suffering on 
the cross; his harp was a prophetic type of the cross, and 
by virtue of that fact was able to drive the evil spirit from 
Saul. In the words of the Psalmist, ' Take a psalm and 
bring hither the timbrel' (Ps. 81. 2); the timbrel typi- 
fied the crucifixion because it was a skin stretched upon 
wood, so also the body of Christ was stretched upon the 
wood of the cross.' 

The staff of David,* the pomegranate tree under which 
Saul rested with his army,^ the pulpit on which Ezra stood 
to address the people,® indeed, any erecting of a pillar or 
altar, the mention of a tree,^ or of anything made from a 
tree, led the exposition directly to the cross. 

Secondly, the form of the cross. The marking of blood 
on the doorposts in the first Passover is frequently referred 
to as made in the sign of the cross. ^ The four letters of 
the Hebrew word for God, written on the brow of the 
priests, signified the four parts of Christ's cross." When- 
ever the number three hundred appeared it was symboli- 
cal of the cross ; for example, in the age of Enoch or in 
the length of the ark." For, according to Bede, following 
the traditions of the Fathers, ' This number is customarily 
represented among the Greeks by the letter T. The letter 

^Bede 8. Z7- ^ Ibid. 4. 376 (Lives of Holy Abbots). 

^Ibid. II. 278. ^Ibid. 8. 100. ^' Ibid. 

* Ibid. 9. 15. ^ Ibid. 9. 359, 372. ^ ^If ric, Horn. 2. 266. 

'Ibid. 7. 324- ^'Ibid. 7. 89. 



Types of the Cross 65 

T holds the figure of the cross, lacking only the apex to be 
the very sign of the cross itself/ ^ 

So also all reference to the raising of the hands, and the 
like, were interpreted as types of the cross. Certainly in 
many, and probably all of these, Bede, Alcuin, and ^Ifric 
simply followed the exposition of the Fathers. 

Thirdly. The explanation of the cross itself. Here also in 
the explanation of the parts of the cross and the position of 
the Savior upon the cross the Anglo-Saxon scholar treads 
carefully in the path of his predecessors. Bede paraphrases 
the passage from Augustine ^ which interprets the words of 
the Apostle : ' What is the breadth and length, and height, 
and depth,' as referring to the dimensions of the cross; 
and Alcuin ^ copies it word for word. Bede prefaces his 
discussion with lines from a poem of Sedulius,* a fifth cen- 
tury poet, 

Quatuor inde plagos quadrat! colligit orbis, 

Splendidus auctoris de vertice fulget eous 

Occiduo sacrse lambuntur sidere plantae 

Arcton dextra tenet, medium laeva erigit axem, 

Cunctaque de membris vivet natura Creantis, 

Et cruce complexum Christus regit undique mundum. 

And Alcuin adds to his quotation from Augustine these 
words which paraphrase Sedulius : ' Indeed as it lay, the 
cross stretched out toward the four quarters of the world, 
east and west, north and south, because even so Christ by 
his passion draws all people to him.' ' ^Ifric, in his ser- 
mon on the Passion, repeats the same thought : * The Lord 
was fastened with four nails facing the west; his left held 
the shining south ; his right, the north ; his head, the east ; 
and he redeemed all the regions of the world hanging 
thus.' " 

But a passage attributed to Alcuin echoes Jerome's com- 
mentary on Ephesians 3, 18.^ The writer says: * More- 

^ Ibid. p. 173. 'Horn. 118, in S. John, sec. 5. 

' 2. 478. * Carmen Paschale. 

" 2. 478. • 2. 254. 

'Zockler calls him Pseudo- Alcuin. 



66 The Cross in Poetry 

over, the very cross contains within itself a great mystery, 
whose position is such that the upper part extends toward 
Heaven, and the lower part, fixed in the earth, touches the 
depths of Hell; its breadth stretches out to the regions of 
the earth/ This grandiose mystical conception of the cross 
became very popular with later writers, and, according to 
Bugge,^ was the idea which gave the Northern mythology 
its picture of Yggdrasil, the world-tree, whose roots 
touched Hell, whose top touched Heaven, and whose 
branches stretched over the earth. 

In all this mystical interpretation of the cross and its 
prophetic types, the work of the Anglo-Saxon theologians 
seems to have been to reproduce faithfully the conception 
of the Fathers, with no original contribution of any import- 
ance whatever. 

(6) In Poetry 

I. Latin. — In the account of the adoration of the cross on 
Good Friday, there were mentioned the anthems Ecce lignum 
crucis, Crucem tuam adoramus, Dum fabricator mundi, and 
the famous hymn by Fortunatus, Pange lingua. Of the 
others by Fortunatus, the Vexilla Regis is given in full in 
the Durham Ritual and in the eleventh century Hymnary 
with its Old English gloss. Alcuin gives the Crux bene- 
dicta nitet, with the Pange lingua, in his Liturgica for Good 
Friday.^ Indeed, he appropriates the entire first line of the 
former for an altar-inscription which he composed, begin- 
ning ' Vexillum sublime crucis venerare fidelis.' ' 

In the Old English Hymnary mentioned above there is 
one other hymn on the cross, which is unglossed, the Salve 
Crux, sancta salve mundi gloria, a hymn by an unknown 
author — according to Chevalier,* probably a Frankish poet 
of the tenth century. 



^ Studien iiber die Entstehung, etc., p. 468 ff. 
'2.90-91. «2. 223. 

* Repertorium Hymnologicum, p. 503. 



Latin Poetry 67 

Among the original productions of Anglo-Saxon writers 
we find that Bede has a Latin hymn on the birthday of St. 
Andrew, in which he puts into the mouth of the saint, as 
he sees his cross in the distance, the following salutation : 

Salve, tropaeum gloriae, 

Salve, sacrum victoriae 

Lignum, Deus quo perditum . 

Mundum redemit mortuus. ^ 

O gloriosa fulgidis 

Crux emicas virtutibus, 

Quam Christus ipse proprii 

Membris dicavit corporis.^ 

However, he has written no single poem on the cross. 

Alcuin, on the other hand, wrote much verse on the cross. 
The following is an inscription for an altar of the cross : 

Ad aram sanctce crucis. 
Aspice, tu lector, nostras pia signa salutis, 
Ecclesiae in medio . . . mirabile donum ; 
Pro mundi vita, mundi jam vita pependit: 
Pro servis moritur Dominus, quem sancta voluntas, 
Viveret ut servus, semper sit cum sanguine servum. 
Hoc memor esto crucem videasque in lumine stantem, 
Et nox ante Dei faciem feliciter ora. 
Corpore sterne solum, scande sed pectore caelum, 
Proque tuis culpis lacrymas effunde calentes; 
Sit tibi certa salus spei pietate perenni. 
Qui redemit mundum, immaculato sanguine, totum, 
Quique suis famulis clemens peccate remittit. 
Hie quoque sit nobis sacrae spes magna salutis, 
Agmine apostolis quoniam haec ara refulsit, 
Et simul Helenae mentis vivacibus almae. 
Quae invenisse crucis fertur mirabile lignum. 
In quo Christus honor mundi, laus, vita pependit ^ 

Dum fuit altithronus pro nobis talia passus. 
Quid nos hunc famuli debemus ob ejus amorem 
Jam, nisi nunc illi nosmet quoque tradere totos? 
Sit Deus ille nobis charitas et tota voluntas 
Laus, honor, et virtus, potus, cibus, omnia Christus.* 

^ Patrolog. Lat. 94. 97. * 2. 219. 



68 Latin Poetry 

One other to the cross is as follows : 

Ad sanctam crucem. 
Vexillum sublime crucis venerare fidelis, 
Qua qui se munit, tristia non metuit, 
Crux benedicta nitet, Dominus qua carne pependit, 
Atque suo clausit funere mentis (F., mortis) iter. 
Hie auctor vitae mortem moriendo peremit, 
Vulneribus sanans vulnera nostra suis.^ 

In this, as has been remarked, an entire line has been 
appropriated from Fortunatus, but in the other, also, are 
turns of phrase which are echoes of the immensely better 
work of the older poet. But Alcuin admired and imitated 
not only the hymns of Fortunatus, but his acrostic verse as 
well, and in these acrostic poems Alcuin gives a labored, 
though evidently sincere, tribute to the cross. Some of them 
are of sufficient importance to quote entire. In his poem 
Crux decus es mundi, he copies the very design of For- 
tunatus,^ one which the latter used in his ' Extorquet hoc 
sorte/ as follows : 




In Alcuin's poem the lines of the figure spell : 

Crux pia vera salus partes in quattuor orbis, 
Surge lavanda tuae sunt ssecula fonte fidei, 
Alma teneto tuam Christo dominante coronam. 
Salve sancta rubens f registi vincula mundi ; 
Signa valete novis reserate salutibus orbi ; 
Rector in orbe tuis sanavit saeclas sigillis, 

^Ihid. 'Patrolog. Lat. 5. 88. 



Latin Poetry 



69 



A second, which honors the cross only by its figures, 
is in praise of Charlemagne. The lines run as follows: 



'. i 

i i 



Here all the horizontal lines begin, ' Flavins amicus Carlus/ 
But these performances of Alcuin fade into insignificance 
beside the work of his comrade, Josephus Scotus, an Irish 
scholar, who accompanied him to the court of Charlemagne. 
His work in this field is much larger in bulk and much more 
ingenious. An acrostic poem of his on the work of redemp- 
tion has this design : 




and reads: 

Ille pater priscus elidet edendo nepotes. 
Mortis imago fuit mulier poma suasrix. 
Jessus item nobis ieiunans norma salutis. 
Mors fugit vita veniens ex virgine radix. 

The small cross in the center reads : ' Lege feliciter 
Carle.^ 

Another, a sort of epistolary sermon addressed to Charle- 
magne, has this scheme : 




70 



Old English Poetry 



A third, which is a flattering address to the royal patron, 
makes the cross thus : 



t'"'-Tt' 



UD 

And lastly, the most elaborate of all is a long one on the 
Holy Cross itself, where the cruciform design is as follows : 




The lines of the figure read thus : 

Crux mihi certa salus Christi sacrata cruore; 
Crux decus seternum toto venerabile sceclo; 
Crux vita salus credentis Crux mors poena negantis. 
Sancta cruci semper salvit inscriptio corda. 

Thus the cruciform acrostic, originated by Fortunatus, 
was revived by Alcuin, and elaborated still further by his 
friend Scotus. The tradition was then passed on to Alcuin's 
pupil, Rabanus Maurus, the great German singer of the 
cross of the ninth century. His name is the one most com- 
monly associated with this species of literature, and under 
his hand it far surpassed all preceding efforts in quantity and 
ingenuity. With him the art may be said to have reached 
its best, or its worst, according to the point of view. 

2. Old English. — The Latin hymns and verses on the cross 
which belong to the Anglo-Saxon period are either the old 
hymns, especially those of Fortunatus, used in the service of 
the church, or imitations of his work. But in Old English 
poetry we find an element that, while founded upon the tra- 
dition and rites of the church, is fresh and distinctively 



Old English Poetry 71 

national. The three most important poems for this study 
are the Elene, the Dream of the Rood, and the Christ. 

At the outset of this chapter we came upon a metrical 
homily of JElfric's on the Exaltation of the Cross — a story 
told in verse without ever becoming poetry ; and Cynewulf's 
Elene, in which the story of the finding of the holy relic is 
described with energy and spirit. But at the close of the 
Elene, in a little obscure passage of autobiography, Cyne- 
wulf says that he was ' guilty of misdeeds, fettered by sins, 
tormented with anxieties, bound with bitternesses.' Then 
' the mighty King granted me his blameless grace, and shed 
it into my mind, . . . unlocked my heart and released the 
power of song.' After his conversion he turned to con- 
template the cross, the means of his salvation. ' Not once 
alone, but many times, I reflected on the tree of glory, 
before I had the miracle disclosed concerning the glorious 
tree, as in the course of events I found related in books, 
in writings, concerning the sign of victory.' This * miracle ' 
he has related, evidently as a tribute of love, in the Elene. 

The authorship of the Dream of the Rood is unknown, 
but it seems probable that this, too, was written by Cyne- 
wulf. It tells of a marvelous vision of the cross. The 
opening lines seem to echo the vision of Constantine. 

Hark! of a matchless vision would I speak, 
Which once I dreamed at midnight, when mankind 
At rest were dwelling. Then methought I saw 
A wondrous cross extending up on high, 
With light encircled, tree of trees most bright. 
That beacon all was overlaid with gold; 
And near the earth stood precious stones ablaze, 
While five more sparkled on the shoulder-beam. 

No cross was that of wickedness and shame, 
But holy spirits, men on earth, and all 
The glorious creation on it gazed. 
Sublime the tree victorious ... 

Fearful was I before that radiant sight. 

There I beheld that beacon quick to change, ^ 



^2 Old English Poetry 

Alter in vesture and in coloring; 

Now dewed with moisture, soiled with streaming blood, 

And now with gold and glittering gems adorned. 

A long time lying there I sadly looked 
Upon the Saviour's cross, until I heard 
Resounding there a voice. That wood divine 
Then spake. . . . 

I beheld the Master of mankind 
Approach with lordly courage as if He 
Would mount upon me, and I dared not bow 
Nor break, opposing the command of God, 
Although I saw earth tremble; all my foes 
I might have beaten down, yet I stood fast. 

Then the young Hero laid his garments by, 
He that was God Almighty, strong and brave; 
And boldly in the sight of all He mounted 
The lofty cross, for he would free mankind. 
Then, as the Man divine clasped me, I shook; 
Yet dared I not bow to the earth nor fall 
Upon the ground, but I must needs stand fast. 
A cross upraised I lifted a great King, 
Lifted the Lord of heaven ; and dared not bow. 
They pierced me with dark nails, and visible 
Upon me still are scars, wide wounds of malice, 
Yet might I injure none among them all. 
They mocked us both together; then was I 
All wet with his blood, which streamed from this man's side 
When he at length had breathed the spirit out. 

* Now mayest thou know, O hero mine, beloved ! 
Unutterable sorrows I endured. 
Base felons' work. But now hath come the time 
When, far and wide, men on the earth, and all 
The glorious universe doth honor me, 
And to this beacon bow themselves in prayer. 
On me a while suffered the Son of God; 
Therefore now full of majesty I tower 
High under heaven; and I have power to heal 
All those who do me reverence.' 

Happy in mind I prayed then to the rood 
With great devotion, where I was alone 



Old English Poetry 73 

Without companionship; my soul within 
Was quickened to depart, so many years 
Of utter weariness had I delayed. 
And now my life's great happiness is this, 
That to the cross victorious I may come 
Alone, above the wont of other men 
To worship worthily, . . . 

.... and all my help 
Must reach me from the rood. 

Each day I longing ask : 

When will the cross of Christ, which formerly 

I here on earth beheld, call me away 

From this my transient life, and bring me home 

To all delight, the joyous harmonies 

Of heaven, where sit at feast the folk of God, 

And gladness knows no end. 

This is an adoration of the cross that is not ceremonial or 
conventional, but evidently a genuine expression of personal 
devotion. It is of especial interest for our purpose, because 
it expresses and emphasizes ideas found in many stray pas- 
sages elsewhere. 

First, the idea of the brilliant appearance of the cross, 
shining brightly and adorned with gold and jewels. All 
through Anglo-Saxon literature the cross is constantly re- 
ferred to as shining brightly, especially where it figures 
in visions ; ^ this may be due to the famous vision of Con- 
stantine, or to the presence of gorgeously adorned crosses in 
the church, probably both. Then, too, at the last day, the 
* red rood was to shine brightly over all the earth,' as we 
shall see in the Christ. 

I do not see the necessity of affirming, with Ebert,* that 
the poet must have had in mind a crux stationalis or pro- 
cessional cross in writing this poem. The altar-cross was 
certainly as richly adorned as the processional cross, for that 
matter, although it seems unnecessary to refer the cross 
of this vision to any particular cross of the church service. 

^ Ueber das Angels. Gedicht, Der Traum vom Heiligen Kreus. 
*e. g. Martyrology, p. 206. 



74 Old English Poetry 

The reference to the cross being clothed, wcEdum geweor^od 
(v. 15), may be a recollection of the veiling of the rood on 
Good Friday in the ceremony already described. 

Here, as everywhere else in references to the crucifixion, 
realism plays but little part. Whenever there do occur 
touches of realism, they seem evidences only of a keen sym- 
pathy on the part of the writer with the sufferings of his 
Lord ; for example, the mention of the ' iron nails * with 
which Christ was fastened to the * hard tree ' in ^Ifric,^ 
or, in the Christ, ' the cruel crown of thorns ' and the ' white 
hands ' that were pierced. 

But the crucifixion to the Anglo-Saxons was first of all 
an act of free will; Christ mounted the cross as a king 
would mount his throne, and there he ruled over all the 
world. The willingness of the sacrifice is repeatedly em- 
phasized, and, further, the crucifixion is represented as an 
act of triumph, a deed of royal prowess. So in their cruci- 
fixes the figure was crowned, not with thorns, but with 
a diadem.* 

In endowing the cross with personality, the poet of the 
Dream of the Rood outstrips any other writer. While the 
cross is never represented as sharing in the guilt of the 
crucifixion in this poem, it is not merely a helpless instru- 
ment but a conscious creature, recognizing its Lord, and 
suffering, together with him, grief and pain : In this poem 
the cross is not simply a personality, it is actually deified : 

When will the Cross of Christ, which formerly 

I here on earth beheld, call me away 

From this my transient life, and bring me hence 

To all delights, the joyous harmonies 

Of heaven? 

This deification we have already noticed in the charms, 
where prayers were made to the Holy Rood, and the Holy 
Rood was expected to bring back strayed or stolen cattle. 
So also in the conclusion to the charter of Wihtred's that 

* Horn. I. 144. ' See above, p. 18, note. 



Old English Poetry 75 

was quoted, the curse pronounced upon him who breaks 
his word is this, that ' the Cross of Christ shall come in 
vengeance.' Again, in the conclusion to the apostrophe to 
the Cross that ^Ifric puts into the mouth of Heraclius, he 
says to the Cross, ' Be mindful of this assembly which is 
here gathered together for the honor of God ! ' 

The Christ of Cynewulf we have already quoted from in 
the discussion of the legends of the Cross. But the chief 
importance of this poem for our purpose is the description 
it contains of the apparition of the Cross at the Day of Doom. 
This was not original with Cynewulf, but is in accordance 
with an ancient tradition of the church. 

An Old English prose account of the various days, with 
their signs and wonders, leading up to the Great Day, de- 
scribes the seventh day thus : ' Then shall the Lord reveal 
the cross on which he suffered, and there shall shine a light 
over all the world, and he shall show the wound in his side, 
the wounds of the nails both in his hands and feet, by 
which he was fastened to the cross, as bloody as they were 
on the first day.' ^ We find the same idea in liturgy : in the 
Response at the end of the Third Lesson for the service 
of the Invention is the following : ' Hoc signum crucis erit 
in caelo cum Dominus ad judicandum venerit.' ' 

In the Christ the * red rood shines brightly,* and it 

* blazes upon all peoples.' This idea of its brilliant appear- 
ance is also found in Chrysostom, who describes the cross 
on the last day as ' shining beyond the very sunbeam.' ' 

It is a striking picture that Cynewulf gives of the cross 
on the Day of Judgment ; it is indeed, the poetical apotheo- 
sis of the cross, and with it we may conclude this discussion : 

* There shall sinful man, sad at heart, behold the greatest 
affliction. Not for their behoof shall the cross of our Lord, 
brightest of beacons, stand before all nations, wet with the 
pure blood of heaven's King, stained with his gore, shining 

^Das JUngste Gericht. *q. Cook, note on Christ 192. 

* Horn. 76, on Matt. 24, 16-8; cf. Cook, note on Christ 189. 



y6 Summary 

brightly over the vast creation. Shadows shall be put to 
flight when the resplendent cross shall blaze upon all 
peoples, . . . when the red rood shall shine brightly over all 
in the sun's stead.'* 

Summary 

Up to this point we have reviewed the various aspects of 
the cross in Anglo-Saxon life and literature, section by 
section. The arrangement into sections is arbitrary, but it 
serves as well as any other to suggest the diversity of forms 
in which this symbol appeared, and the many sides of life 
which it influenced. 

The liturgical part of the subject I have not felt com- 
petent to discuss in detail, but have left it with references 
where such detail may be found. I have felt, too, that it 
had less intimate touch with life and literature than other 
aspects to which I have devoted more space. However, 
there has been sufficient material presented to show that the 
religion of the period was indeed the religion of the cross, 
from the ceremonial of adoration on Good Friday to the 
sign of benediction, or the crossing oneself which accom- 
panied every rite of the church. And, as the church of 
the early Middle Ages touched life on all its sides, this 
devotion to the cross found expression in matters of every 
day — in curing sickness, in blessing the tools of trade, in 
restoring fertility to barren fields, as a charm against mis- 
fortune, a solemn form of oath, an inviolable boundary-mark 
and place of sanctuary, the favorite motive of decoration 
on manuscript, on jewels, bowls, and on the very coins of 
commerce. Finally, as a monument, it greeted the eye on 
every side, on field and highway, in churchyard and market- 
place. In brief, the old term of mockery, ' worshiper of 
the cross,' which Aldhelm ^ applied to himself as a synonym 
for ' Christian,' sums up the story in a word. 

The significance of the cross which lay at the foundation 

Ml. 1080-1100. ' Patrolog. Lat. 39. 105. 



Summary yy 

of all these differing aspects, and unites them all, is stated 
by a homilist thus : 

There is much need for us to bear in mind how the Lord deliv- 
ered us by his passion from the Devil's power when he ascended 
the rood-tree and shed his precious blood for our salvation. Where- 
fore we ought to honor the holy victory-sign of Christ's cross, and 
follow after it, and pray for the forgiveness of our sins all together, 
since he suffered for us all on the cross, and endured at the hands 
of the wicked Jewish people all those reproaches.^ 

Because the True Cross was the instrument by which 
humanity was ransomed, it was the most precious of earthly 
possessions, it was wreathed in legends telling of its mar- 
velous odor and life-giving properties, and splinters from 
it were shrined in precious metals. The representations of 
the cross standing in the church were adorned with gold, 
silver, and jewels, because it was the symbol of the Re- 
deemer, and before them the Christian bowed in adoration. 
He conceived of it even as a divine personality, and invoked 
it as a saint or a God. And, at last, on the judgment scene 
of the Great Day, he looked to see it ablaze with ruddy light, 
towering over all the world. 

In the greater part of all the forms of the cross-worship, 
we have found simply the ideas and practices of the mother 
church, persisting with little variation on English soil. 
The rites of the cross in liturgy, the use and significance of 
the sign of the cross, the vast body of legends of the miracle 
of the cross, the hymns, the theological literature of the 
cross — all were transferred from the church of Rome to the 
church of the Anglo-Saxons. While in these ideas and 
practices we find no strikingly original elements, they are 
significant in that they took such deep root in English soil, 
and overshadowed all classes of society. Even to the semi- 
pagan, to whom the literature of the Fathers meant nothing, 
and the ritual in the church little more, the cross was a 
potent talisman to add to his ancient heathen formulas, and 
he accepted and trusted it as a * victory- token.' 

^Blickl. Horn., p. 96. 



yS Summary 

It would be difficult to define just the contribution of the 
Anglo-Saxons to the cult of the cross. Possibly that deifica- 
tion of the cross that we have noticed was first developed on 
English soil. As far as I can discover, it transcends any 
veneration of the cross that was known in Rome, and as it 
is expressed in the Dream of the Rood it appears earlier 
than in any other piece of literature in Europe. 

The cross-poetry of the Anglo-Saxons was certainly a 
contribution to the literature of the cross. It must have 
been widely known in England, from the testimony of the 
Ruthwell and Brussels Cross inscriptions, and of its influ- 
ence abroad we shall have to speak later. 

The stone cross with interlaced ornament, while a pro- 
duct of Irish rather than Anglo-Saxon genius, became an 
important feature of Anglo-Saxon life, and far surpassed 
the plain monumental cross of the tradition of Rome. 

In the sculpture of the cross and the poetry of the cross, 
the emblem of Christianity reached among the Anglo- 
Saxons its most devoted and most artistic expression. 

Beside the main points noted above, it is necessary to 
recapitulate two matters of date which were established by 
the investigation for this chapter, and are important for 
the discussion in the chapter which follows. First, the 
stone cross with Celtic ornament, which we have called the 
interlaced cross, was not known in England before the 
ninth century. Secondly, the crucifix also was unknown 
in England before the latter part of the same century, and 
did not come into general use till the late tenth and eleventh 
centuries. 



Chapter II 

THE ANGLO-SAXON CROSS IN ITS HISTORICAL SETTING 

The great diversity of forms in which the cross mani- 
fested itself, and the evident v^armth and sincerity of the 
veneration accorded to it, show how powerful an influence 
it exerted over the lives and thoughts of this people. We 
shall try to discover, in this concluding chapter, if there 
were any events or influences in the Anglo-Saxon period 
which could have tended to intensify a spirit of devotion 
to the cross. 

The earliest recorded appearance of the cross is that 
which figured in the procession of Augustine and his monks 
as they went to meet King Ethelbert. After the king had 
granted them permission to settle in Canterbury, Bede says 
that they drew near to the city, also, * with the holy cross.' 
The first impression of the cross upon the pagan mind was, 
therefore, that of a standard of the new Faith. So, too, 
when the missionaries penetrated farther into heathen terri- 
tory, they erected crosses as standards and as places of wor- 
ship and exhortation. 

In the next event of importance in the history of the cross 
in Anglo-Saxon England, this idea of the cross as a standard 
is strikingly exemplified. It is the victory of Oswald over 
Cadwalla in 633. To get a picture of the situation of the 
Angles just before this event, we may turn to the rather 
florid account of Sharon Turner (1.242-3) : 

The Welsh king, Cadwallon, full of projects of revenge against 
the nations of the Angles, continued his war. Osric rashly ventured 
to besiege him in a strong town, but an unexpected sally of Cad- 
wallon destroyed the king of Deira. For a year the victor desolated 
Northumbria : his success struck Eanrid with terror, and his panic 
hurried him to his fate. He went with twelve soldiers to sue for 
peace of the Welshman. Notwithstanding the sacred purpose of his 
visit, he was put to death. 



8o Historical Setting 

The swords of Cadwallon and his army seemed the agents des- 
tined to fulfill their cherished prophecy. The fate of the Anglo- 
Saxons was now about to arrive; three of their kings had been 
already offered up to the shades of the injured Cymry; an Arthur 
had revived in Cadwallon. . . . Triumphant with the fame of four- 
teen great battles and sixty skirmishes, Cadwallon despised Oswald, 
the brother and successor of Eanfrid, who rallied the Bernician forces 
and attempted to become the deliverer of his country. 

For the rest of the story, let us listen to Bede : 

In the third book of his Ecclesiastical History, he tells how 
Cadwalla, the king of the Britons, ' for the space of a year reigned 
over the provinces of the Northumbrians, not like a victorious 
king, but like a rapacious and bloody tyrant,' and how he ended 
his series of bloody deeds by treacherously slaying Eanfrid, who 
came to him to a parley for terms of peace. ' To this day,' continues 
the historian, ' that year is looked upon as unhappy, and hateful to all 
good men. . . . Hence it has been agreed by all who have written 
about the reigns of the kings to abolish the memory of those 
perfidious monarchs, and to assign that year to the reign of the fol- 
lowing king, Oswald, a man beloved by God. This last king, after 
the death of his brother Eanfrid, advanced with an army, small 
indeed in number, but strengthened with the faith of Christ; and 
the impious commander of the Britons was slain, though he had 
most numerous forces, which he boasted nothing could withstand, 
at a place in the English tongue called Denisesburn, that is, Denis' 
brook. 

* The place is shown to this day, and held in much veneration 
where Oswald, being about to engage, erected the sign of the holy 
cross, and on his knees prayed to God that he would assist his 
worshipers in their great distress. It is further reported that the 
cross, being made in haste, and the hole dug in which it was to be 
fixed, the king himself, full of faith, laid hold of it and held it 
with both hands, till it was set fast by throwing in the earth, and 
this done, raising his voice, he cried to his army, " Let us all kneel, 
and jointly beseech the true and living God Almighty, in his mercy, 
to defend us from the haughty and fierce enemy; for He knows 
that we have undertaken a just war for the safety of our nation." 
All did as he had commanded, and accordingly, advancing toward 
the enemy with the first dawn of day, they obtained the victory as 
their faith deserved. In that place of prayer very many miraculous 
cures are known to have been performed, as a token and a memorial 

'Chaps. I and 2. 



Historical Setting 8i 

of the king's faith; for even to this day, many are wont to cut 
oflF small chips from the wood of the holy cross, which being put 
into water, men and cattle drinking thereof, or sprinkled with that 
water, are immediately restored to health. 

*The place in the English tongue is called Heavenfield, or the 
Heavenly Field, which name it formerly received as a presage of 
what was afterward to happen, denoting that there the heavenly 
trophy would be erected, the heavenly victory begun, and heavenly 
miracles be wrought to this day/ 

A cruciform church was built on the site of the battle, 
and the wooden cross that performed so many miracles, and 
that was still standing in Bede's day, was replaced after its 
final decay by a cross of stone, to commemorate the event. 

King Oswald became both a national hero and a saint, 
and, after his death in a battle against the Mercians, was 
regarded as a martyr. ^Ifric, for example, devotes a 
metrical homily to ' St. Oswald, King and Martyr.' 

After his death the very ground on which he fell became 
potent for the healing of the sick. Bede says,^ 

How great his faith was towards God, and how remarkable his 
devotion, has been made evident by miracles since his death; for 
in the place where he was killed by the pagans, fighting for his 
country, infirm men and cattle are healed to this day. Whereupon 
many took up the very dust of the place where his body fell, and 
putting it into water, did much good with it to their friends who were 
sick. This custom came so much into use that, the earth being car- 
ried away by degrees, there remained a hole as deep as the height 
of a man. 

Some of these miracles the historian narrates in detail, 
but he gives much more space to the wondrous miracles 
effected by the bones of the sainted king. A heavenly 
light shone all night over his relics, devils were cast out 
from a man whom the priests had exorcised in vain, a boy 
was cured of ague, and a man was healed at the point of 
death. 

These tales of miracle show how strong a hold Oswald 
and his rood had upon the popular imagination. Indeed, 

^ Eccles. Hist., chap. 9. 



82 Historical Setting 

it is not likely that the influence of this victory upon the 
national feeling for the cross can be overestimated. The 
cross had delivered the Angles from their enemies in the 
hour of greatest need. It was the victory of Constantine 
repeated in England, and probably the obvious points of 
similarity in the two stories helped to make the legend of 
Constantine as popular as it evidently was. This victory 
of Oswald, as well as that of Constantine, formed the asso- 
ciations with the cross that made appropriate the familiar 
Old English epithet sige-heacn, the ' banner of victory.' 

Alcuin and JElfric both give accounts of this victory of 
the rood, both, however, based upon the narrative of Bede. 
Alcuin's account is contained in his poem De PontiUcihus 
et Sanctis Ecclesice Eboracensis. In this, the only varia- 
tion worthy of note is that in the speech that he puts into 
the mouth of Oswald the army is bidden to bow to the cross : 

Substernite vestros 
Vultus ante crucem. 

Accordingly, the entire army, on their knees before the 
cross, pray to God. Alcuin has inserted an Adoration cere- 
mony into the story. 

As we pass from the seventh to the eighth century we 
find no historical event of significance in connection with 
the cross, and in literature only the cross-symbolism of 
Bede. While he frequently repeats, as his life-motto, ' Mihi 
absit gloria, nisi in cruce Christi Domini nostri,' he gives 
no evidence of a special feeling of love for the cross ; he 
merely repeats the traditions as he found them in the 
Fathers, without particular emphasis. 

But in the latter part of the eighth century we come upon 
remarkable poetry of the cross in the work of Cynewulf — 
and whoever else may have been the poet of the Dream of 
the Rood — ^in which the adoration of the cross reaches its 
most ardent expression. Closely following this comes the 
Latin of Alcuin, who is decidedly a cross-worshiper, though 

* e. g. Opera, ed. Giles, 4. 181 ; 7. 126. 



The Influence of Ireland 83 

he was unable to rise to the level of the Old English 
poetry. He expressed his devotion to the cross chiefly 
by developing mystical interpretations of its parts, and by 
reviving and imitating the work of Fortunatus, especially 
in the cruciform acrostic. In this his colleague, Josephus 
Scotus, followed his example and surpassed it. 

According to the Chronicle^ in the year 773 ' a fiery 
Christ-sign appeared in the heavens after sunset,' and in the 
year 800, * a cross appeared in the moon on a Wednesday at 
dawn.' These are the only apparitions of the cross re- 
corded. The first cruciform church of which we have 
record, after the church of Oswald at Heavenfield, was 
built in 810.^ At some time early in the ninth century began 
the custom of erecting crosses adorned with the famous 
interlaced ornament. This custom seems to have come 
from Ireland, but to have spread rapidly over England, 
Scotland, and Wales. The custom continued in England, 
at any rate, up to the time of the Norman invasion. Finally, 
at the battle of Hastings, the army that fought with Harold 
in the defense of their country shouted the battle-cry, * The 
Holy Cross, the Cross of God ! ' 

We find on looking over the course of events in Anglo- 
Saxon history that, while the cross became almost a national 
emblem, special interest seems to have been focused upon 
it during the latter part of the eighth and the first part of 
the ninth centuries. Of the events in Anglo-Saxon history 
which we have anything to do with the cross, the victory 
of Oswald is easily of the first importance. Let us see if 
the effect of this could have been reinforced by influences 
from outside of England. 

I. THE INFLUENCE OF IRELAND 

The art of the Anglo-Saxons was chiefly an imitation of 
Irish art. It was from Ireland that they learned the 
arts of illumination, of metal-work, and of carving in stone. 

*See p. 9. 



84 The Influence of Ireland 

Tfie types of ornament came also from the same source, 
notably the famous interlaced patterns that we have already 
discussed. There were also elements in decoration which 
came from Frankish artists, and others from Scandinavian, 
but the basis of all Anglo-Saxon art was the style that came 
from Ireland, and that reached there the most perfect 
development. 

But this influence may not have been restricted to the 
style of ornamentation or the shape of the crosses. The 
monumental cross itself, as we have seen, developed in the 
British Isles, not from the cross as it was set up in Rome, 
but from the ancient monoliths of the pagan Celts. We 
have seen that the huge stone was consecrated to Christian 
use by the Chi-Rho, or a cross with a circle cut upon its 
surface; then the stones were roughly hewn into the 
shape of a cross ; finally, a graceful shaft was surmounted by 
a cross and ring, the whole covered with a wealth of inter- 
laced ornament. 

It was natural that the Celtic convert would the more 
readily erect stone monuments which, as his artistic powers 
developed, would tend to take the shape of the emblems of 
his faith. If one may trust the story of the life of St. 
Patrick, this is strikingly confirmed. In this there is such 
frequent reference to monumental crosses as to lead one to 
believe that they must have fairly studded the country-side. 
The island of lona, also, a missionary outpost of the Irish 
church, was famous for its three hundred and sixty crosses. 
And in the west of Cornwall, where Irish missionaries 
labored, are a great many remains of ancient stone crosses 
which precede the time of interlaced ornament. 

As in Anglo-Saxon England there were evidently few 
crosses before the interlaced period, it seems probable that 
something in the latter eighth century produced a greater 
devotion toward the cross, which led the Irish artist to 
devote his painstaking efforts in interlaced design to the 
stone surface of the cross, and which caused the Anglo- 



Teutonic Paganism 85 

Saxons to adopt this species of cross for themselves, and to 
erect great numbers of them. 

In the development of the monumental cross we noticed 
a trace of an ancient pagan custom of the Celts. This is 
worth inquiring into, to see if there were any elements in 
Teutonic paganism which contributed to the use of the cross 
among the Christian Anglo-Saxons. 

II. TEUTONIC PAGANISM 

According to Grimm,^ the swastika was a holy sign 
among the Teutons, and was called by them the hamars- 
mark. This sign was held sacred ; they cut it on trees as a 
boundary-mark, and in blessing the cup the sign of the 
hammer was made. The significance of blessing, or good 
luck, seems to have clung to this ancient symbol in all of 
its world-wide migrations. 

According to other authorities, the swastika is not the 
hammer of Thor at all, and has no connection with 
the hammer of Thor. 'The best Scandinavian authors,' 
says Wilson,^ ' report " Thor hammer " to be the same as 
the Greek Tau, the same form as the Roman and English 
capital T.' 

If we accept this, we can only recognize an added cross 
symbol — ^the tau cross, or Thor's hammer — which had a 
sacred significance to the pagan. The swastika as the sign 
of blessing was certainly known and employed. It is found 
on sepulchral urns, ceintures, brooches, fibulae, pins, spear- 
heads, swords, scabbards, etc., in Germany, Bavaria, and 
Scandinavia.' 

In these uses — the marking of a boundary, the blessing of 
the cup, weapons, and utensils, and the sign upon the burial- 
urn — it is easy to see the likeness to certain Christian uses of 
the cross, or the sign of the cross. It seems not improbable 
that such uses, familiar to the pagan, would have made the 

^ Teutonic Mythology, Stallybrass, p. 1345. 

' The Swastika, p. 770. * Ibid. pp. 862 ff. 



86 Teutonic Paganism 

same uses of a Christian figure, almost identical, readily 
accepted. 

As a matter of fact, the swastika was known among the 
Anglo-Saxons,^ and persisted, at any rate in the ornament 
of their crosses and coins, after the establishment of Chris- 
tianity. The illuminations of the Christian Irish show the 
same device, Wilson^ mentions the baptismal font of an 
ancient church in Denmark as decorated with swastikas, 
showing its use in early Christian times there. 

It is evident, then, that the sign was not only not re- 
garded as a device of heathenism, but was accepted by 
Christians, even, as a form of their cross. 

Moreover, both Celtic and Teutonic paganism recognized 
sacred stones. In Ireland, St. Patrick purified certain of 
these sacred stones at Mag Selce by inscribing Christian 
symbols on them. In England, stone-worship had to be 
forbidden by a special law in King Edgar's time; and the 
words of ^Ifric, ' no Christian man can gain for himself 
help at any tree or stone save from the holy rood-token,* 
show that as late as his time the worship of trees and stones 
still persisted. It is not improbable that the Christian priest 
was all the more ready to erect the stone cross in order to 
give the people a stone to which they might bow in worship 
with propriety.' 

Of the ancient myths a great deal has been made in 
regard to their effect upon the ideas of Christian Europe, 
especially in connection with the conceptions of Christ and 
the cross. There are, indeed, striking similarities in the 
Christian and heathen notions. For example, as Christ 
hung upon the gallows — a common term for the cross — so 

' Ibid., p. 870. = Ihid., p. 867. 

^ It might be added that the idea of bringing the cross into the 
field of battle, as Oswald did, is not unlike a custom of the pagan 
Saxons, if we may accept the testimony of Sharon Turner. * The 
priests in the hour of battle/ he says, * took their favorite image from 
its column and carried it to the field* (Turner, Hist. A.-S. 5. i. 156). 



Teutonic Paganism 87 

Odin hung upon a tree/ which is called a gallows. As 
Christ, one with God yet the Son of God, offered himself 
a sacrifice to God in behalf of man, so Odin was a willing 
sacrifice unto himself/ Odin and Christ were both wounded 
with a spear as they hung, and both cried aloud with an- 
guish. 

The resemblance' continues also between the mythical 
treatment of the cross and the myths of the holy tree of 
the pagans. Odin hung on this tree, and, like Christ, is 
represented as the fruit of this tree. This world-tree, 
Yggdrasil, corresponds in many points with the mystical 
rood-tree of the Christians. It is called the best of trees, 
the * tree of life,' and it is described like the tree of life in 
Paradise — with which the cross was fused — as having a 
spring of living water at its foot, its top touching the sky, 
its branches spreading over all the world, and Hell lying 
beneath its roots. 

The relations of Christian and pagan myth in the light of 
these correspondences has been the subject of much discus- 
sion and difference of opinion. Stephens regarded this 
parallelism as due to pagan influence upon Christians, or the 
persistence of old traditions among those who were only 
nominally Christianized. Sophus Bugge just reversed the 
order, and developed the theory that it was the Christian 
ideas which affected the neighboring heathen. Miillenhoff, 
in his Deutsche Altertumskunde, contradicts Bugge, and 
declares again for the native, Germanic origin of the pagan 
myths. This seems the most natural supposition, and noth- 
ing save the scholastic passion for sources need interfere 
with the opinion that Teutonic mythology and Christian 
tradition had independent origins. This, however, does 
not interfere with the possibility that the correspondence of 
pagan and Christian ideas — as in the swastika noted above 

^ Hovamol, stanzas no ff. ^ Ibid. 

' For detailed study of correspondences, see Bugge's Studien iiber 
die Entstehung der Nordischen Gotter- und Heldensagen. 



88 Teutonic Paganism 

— ^made easier the acceptance of the latter, or a persistence 
of the one alongside of the other. 

The traces of pagan mythology that concern us are found 
in the pictorial ornament of some of the interlaced crosses. 
Here the difficulty is that many of the representations may 
be interpreted as easily in a Christian as a pagan sense. 
For example, upon some of the crosses (e. g., the Dearham 
Standing Cross ),^ 'is carved a conventionalized tree. It 
is customary to interpret this as the heathen world-ash 
Yggdrasil. It may readily be accounted for by Christian 
symbolism. The cross was constantly referred to as a tree, 
and most often as the tree of life. In Fortunatus,^ the figure 
is carried out into details of branches, leaves, blossoms, fruit, 
and seed. What could be more appropriate for a Christian 
to carve upon the shaft of a cross than the figure of a tree ? * 

Upon the Gosforth Cross is a figure with arms out- 
stretched, the blood gushing from a wound in the right side ; 
a male figure stands at its right, holding a spear; and on 
its left, two female figures. Calverley interprets the central 
figure as Balder, the son of Odin, who was killed by an 
arrow of mistletoe shot by the evil god Loki. But since 
it was customary to carve representations of the crucifixion 
upon crosses of this later style, what more natural than to 
interpret this as one of them, with Longinus on one side, 
and Mary with Mary Magdalene on the other? Beneath 
the foot of one of the women is a serpent, evidently in 
memory of the prophecy, fulfilled in that scene, that the 
woman's seed should bruise the head of the serpent. 

Again, on the Cross at Kirby Stephen is a rude carving 
of a male figure bound like a malefactor. The curious part 
of this is that it has conspicuous horns, Calverley and 
Stephens call it * Loki bound,' in reference to a myth which 
we shall meet later. This may be its true explanation, but 
it is also possible to refer it to Satan, who was to be bound 
' a thousand years ' and cast into the ' bottomless pit.' * I 

* Calverley, p. 515. ^ Crux benedicta and Pange lingua, 

' Rev. 20. 2-3. 



Teutonic Paganism 89 

know of no tradition that gives Loki horns, though it was 
a familiar mediaeval attribute of Satan. 

On the other hand, there are carvings which are un- 
doubtedly of pagan significance. These pictorial carvings 
on crosses belong to the period of Scandinavian influence, 
and were probably executed by Scandinavian artists. As 
the memories of pagan myth would be fresher among the 
Danes than among any other Christianized race of the 
British Isles, it would be surprising if there were no traces 
of pagan tradition in their art. As a fact, much of this 
pictorial ornament can be explained only in this way ; these 
are myths, not only of pagan origin, but also bearing no 
resemblance to Christian doctrines or traditions.^ 

Calverley has pointed out the representations of three 
heathen monsters in the carving of some of these crosses, 
and his explanation seems the most reasonable that can be 
found : 

The three monsters whose fathers was Loki, and whose mother 
was the witch of Jotunhein (the land of giants), were the Fenris- 
wolf, Jormungand, the monster of the universe, also called Midgard's 
Worm, — the huge snake that lay in the great sea coiled around the 
earth; and a daughter, Hel. 

Now when the gods heard that this kindred was being bred up 
in Jotunheim, and knowing that from such a stock all evil was to 
be expected on both father's and mother's side, Alfadir bade the 
children be brought to him, and the worm or snake he cast into the 
deep sea that lay around all lands, where it grew so that it coiled 
itself around all the earth and bit its tail with its teeth.' 

Any one who looks at the huge monster on the top of the 
Brigham cross-socket, coiled round the hollow, . . . and biting its 
tail with its teeth, must at once identify the Midgard worm.' 

' In the Brigham cross-socket,' continues Calverley, ' we 
have a full representation of the incarnation of Loki, Fenris, 
the Midgard snake, Hel, and the horse [on which Hel 
rode *] , all under bonds. And the cross-head, in similar 
symbolism, represents the victory over the powers of evil.' 

^ Gylfaginning, 34- ^Calverley, p. 141. 

•p. 141. *The brackets are mine. 



go Teutonic Paganism 

One of these may serve as a type. On the shortest of the 
sculptured sides of the socket is a figure which Calverley 
describes as * composed of a wide distended throat, over 
whose cavernous depths fang-Hke Hmbs appear to close with 
ominous strength.' This is probably Hel, the goddess of 
the dead, who lived under the root of the great world-tree, 
and devoured those who died of sickness or old age.^ Grimm 
says of her that ' she has gaping yawning jaws ascribed to 
her like the wolf; pictures in the MS. of Csedmon represent 
her simply by a wide open mouth.' From this comes, of 
course, our word ' Hell,' and the mediaeval representations 
of Hell-mouth in manuscripts, sculpture, and mystery-play. 

' In the Danish popular belief,' says Grimm, ' Hel is a 
three-legged horse that goes around the country as a harbin- 
ger of plague and pestilence. . . . Originally it was no other 
than the steed on which the goddess posted over land, pick- 
ing up the dead that were her due.' ^ 

Curiously enough, three-legged, horse-headed monsters 
are not an uncommon feature of much of this late Scandi- 
navian type of ornament. 

Let us examine one more instance. It is the picture 
of Loki upon the Gosforth Cross. Loki is the Teutonic 
Prometheus, and the story of his imprisonment is as fol- 
lows : ' Skadi took a venomous serpent, and fastened it 
upon Loki's face. The venom trickled down from it. 
Sigurn, Loki's wife, sat by and held a basin under the 
venom ; and when the basin was full, carried the poison out. 
Meanwhile the venom dropped on Loki, who shrank from 
it so violently that the whole earth trembled. This causes 
what are now called earthquakes.^ The carving on the 
cross appears to correspond with this story exactly, show- 
ing Loki bound, with a serpent above, and his wife holding 
out the cup to catch the venom. 

^Cf. Beowulf 1698; Teuton. Myth, i. 312-314. * Ibid. 

^ Calverley, p. 142. 



The Iconoclastic Controversy 91 

These instances are sufficient to show that pagan myths 
did persist^ and appear even upon the ornament of 
some Christian crosses. We have seen, too, that there 
were striking correspondences between the mystical con- 
ceptions of Christ and the cross, and Odin and the tree. 
All this, with the use of the swastika, must have contrib- 
uted a good deal to the reverence of the Anglo-Saxon 
Christian for the cross. Yet it seems too much to say that 
the heritage of Teutonic paganism could furnish enough 
of a spirit for special worship of the cross, or the impulse 
for erecting the famous stone crosses at any particular 
period. 

It must be borne in mind that the pagan ornament just 
discussed was a later development in the art of the cross, 
long after the impulse for erecting the ornamental cross 
had begun, and, indeed, when the art of the stone cross 
had already reached its zenith. It belongs to crosses of 
the tenth or eleventh centuries, belonging to Danish-Saxon 
territory. We have yet to account for the phenomenon of 
the special interest in the cross, which, we have found, 
seemed to be centred in the latter part of the eighth and 
the beginning of the ninth century. 

III. THE ICONOCLASTIC CONTROVERSY 

Let us turn to the history of the church. The great ques- 
tion that stirred the Christian church of this period was 
that of the use of images in worship. 

In the history of the cross in art, we saw that the influ- 
ences that transformed the symbolistic cross with the real- 
istic crucifix came from the image-loving East. The East- 
ern Christian seems to have inherited from the Greeks a 
love for all that appealed to the eye ; and images of Christ, 
of Mary, and the saints came to be so numerous, and so 
commonly worshiped, that the defenders of the Faith had 
great difficulty in answering the charges of idolatry brought 
against the Christians by their enemies, the Jews and 
Mohammedans. A reaction set in, and with Leo III, 



92 Tho Iconoclastic Controversy 

Emperor of the East, the Iconoclastic crusade was begun. 
The history of the long struggle that followed is divided 
by Schaff ^ into three periods: 

I. The war upon images and the abolition of image- 
worship by the Council of Constantinople, a. d. 726-754. 

2. The reaction in favor of image-worship, and its solemn 
sanction by the second council of Nicea, a. d. 754-787. 

3. The renewed conflict of the two parties and the final 
triumph of image-worship, a. d. 842. 

The impulse that set the iconoclastic movement on foot 
was to destroy the force of the charge of idolatry brought 
against the Christians by their enemies. The image-wor- 
shipers, on the other hand, defended themselves by making 
a distinction between the quality of the worship accorded 
to God and that accorded to images, at the same time repu- 
diating the charge of idolatry. 

The first attack upon images was an edict issued by the 
Emperor in 726, which prohibited only the worship of 
images. In a second edict, four years later, he commanded 
that all images and pictures should be removed or de- 
stroyed. He took down the picture of Christ which stood 
over the gate of the palace and substituted for it a plain 
cross, accompanied by an inscription, a part of which is as 
follows : 

' The Emperor can not endure that Christ should be 
sculptured as a mute and lifeless image graven on earthly 
materials. But Leo, and his young son Constantine, have at 
their gates engraven the thrice blessed representation of the 
cross, the glory of believing monarchs.' * 

These edicts aroused a storm of opposition, and the ser- 
vants who took down the picture were killed by a mob. 
Rebellions burst out in the Greek Archipelago, and Pope 
Gregory of Rome openly defied the Emperor. However, in 
his own empire Leo was strong enough to enforce his 
decrees. 

^ Hist. Christ. Church 4. 454. 

*Walch, Essay on Ancient Coins, p. 132. 



The Iconoclastic Controversy 93 

His son, who succeeded him, was also an iconoclast ; he 
summoned a council in 754 which ' condemned and forbade 
the public and private worship of sacred images on pain 
of deposition and excommunication. ... It denounced all 
religious representations by painter or sculptor, as pre- 
sumptuous, pagan, and idolatrous.* 

Leo IV adhered to the same policy, but after his death 
his widow, Irene, labored to restore image-worship. She 
called a council in 787 at Nicsea, which nullified the decree of 
the previous council of the year 754, and pronounced ana- 
themas upon iconoclasts. After the deposition of Irene, 
the controversy went on again for thirty-five or forty years. 
The emperor Theophilus was the last and the most bloody 
of the iconoclastic emperors, but his widow, like Irene, 
brought image-worship back again. A final synod in 842 
restored to the churches images and the worship of images. 
It decreed that the event should evermore be celebrated 
* by a procession and a renewal of the anathema on the 
iconoclastic heretics.' 

Such, in outline, is the history of the great controversy. 
The iconoclasts failed of popular support — as all iconoclasts 
do — because they had nothing to substitute in the place of 
images. Leo and his followers tried to substitute the cross. 
Indeed, all those who opposed the worship of images made 
a notable exception in favor of the cross, attempting to turn 
the feeling of reverence toward the one visible symbol to 
which it might properly be offered. But to the Greeks, and 
to the Church of Rome which had felt much of Greek influ- 
ence, the cross as a visible image was insufficient. 

In the West, however, the feeling was different. The 
adoration of the cross and the veneration of saints' relics 
took the place that the worship of images held in the East. 
The Teutonic tribes did not have the artistic traditions of 
the Greeks, and apparently did not crave sculptured or 
painted representations of Christ and the saints as objects 
of worship. 

' Schaff 4. 457-8. 



94 The Iconoclastic Controversy 

For the attitude of the Frankish church in this icono- 
clastic controversy, I quote once more from Schaff (4. 

467): 

Charlemagne, with the aid of his chaplains, especially Alcuin, 
prepared and published, three years after the Nicene Council, an im- 
portant work on image-worship under the title Quatuor Libri Carolini 
(790). He dissents both from the iconoclastic synod of 754 and 
the anti-iconoclastic synod of 787, but more from the latter, 
which he treats very disrespectfully. He decidedly rejects image- 
worship, but allows the use of images for ornament and 
devotion, and supports his view with Scripture passages and 
patristic quotations. The spirit and aim of the book is almost 
Protestant. The chief thoughts are these: God alone is the object 
of worship and adoration (colendus et adorandus). Saints are 
only to be revered (venerandi). Images can in no sense be wor- 
shiped. To bow or kneel before them, to salute or kiss them, to 
strew incense and light candles before them, is idolatrous and super- 
stitious. It is far better to search the Scriptures, which know nothing 
of such practices. The tales of miracles wrought by images are 
inventions of the imagination, or deceptions of the evil spirit. On 
the other hand, the iconoclasts, in their honest zeal against idolatry, 
went too far in rejecting images altogether. The legitimate and 
proper use of images is to adorn the churches and to perpetuate and 
popularize the memory of the persons and events which they repre- 
sent. Yet even this is not necessary; for a Christian should be 
able to rise to the contemplation of the virtues of the saints and to 
ascend to the fountain of eternal light. . . . The Council of Nicea 
committed a great wrong in condemning those who do not worship 
images. 

The author of the Caroline books, however, falls into the same 
inconsistency as the Eastern iconoclasts, by making an exception in 
favor of the sign of the cross and the relics of the saints. The cross 
is called a banner which puts the enemy to flight, and the honoring 
of relics is declared to be a great means of promoting piety. 

A Synod in Frankfort, a. d. 794, the most important held during 
the reign of Charlemagne, and representing the churches of France 
and Germany, in the presence of two papal legates . . . endorsed the 
doctrine of the Libri Carolini, unanimously condemned the worship 
of images in any form, and rejected the seventh ecumenical council. 
According to an old tradition, the English church agreed with this 
decision. 

Let us see if anything beside * an old tradition ' points 
to the agreement of the English Church. The Frankfort 



The Iconoclastic Controversy 95 

Synod supported the Caroline Books, which we have seen 
the Emperor prepared and published ' with the aid of his 
chaplains, especially Alcuin/ Schaff says in his biography 
of Alcuin (4. 687) : ' In 794 he took a prominent part, 
although simply a deacon, in the council of Frankfort.' 
Also, in a foot-note to the last sentence of our long quota- 
tion, he says : ' This [the agreement of the English Church] 
rests partly on the probable share which the Anglo-Saxon 
Alcuin had in the composition of the Caroline Books, partly 
on the testimony of Simeon of Durham/ Again, in his 
biography of Alcuin, he says : ' In 792 he sent, in the name 
of the English bishops, a refutation of image-worship.' 
This is the ' testimony of Simeon of Durham,' and here, evi- 
dently, the historian believes it may be accepted for truth. 

But the testimony of the sort we have gained from the 
investigation of the previous chapter confirms what already 
seems probable. In all the Anglo-Saxon literature, whether 
in the vernacular or in Latin, there is not a hint that 
images were ever used for worship. Lingard, in his dis- 
cussion of paintings in the Anglo-Saxon church,^ says, ' Of 
any species of religious honor paid to the paintings them- 
selves, I do not recollect any instance in the contemporary 
records. But with respect to the cross it was far otherwise.' 

Augustine brought a picture of Christ upon landing in 
England, and Benedict Biscop in the seventh century 
brought paintings from Rome. But even such adornment 
was rare, and, as Lingard says, there is no evidence that 
these pictures received ' any species of religious honor.' 

In the previous chapter we found that the crucifix was 
apparently unknown in England till the end of the ninth 
century. This is an important piece of evidence in deter- 
mining the attitude of the English Church toward image- 
worship during the great controversy. If even the crucified 
image was unknown, to say nothing of being worshiped, 
it is not difficult to guess the position of the English clergy 
in this quarrel. 

^ Hist, and Antiq. 2. 108. 



96 The Iconoclastic Controversy 

Indeed, all the evidence there is points toward the full 
sympathy of the English Church with the tenor of the 
Caroline Books and the Frankfort decrees. Nay, more, 
these were probably the expression of the English Church 
itself through Alcuin. Alcuin was not the kind of man to 
stand apart from the traditions in which he was bred — like 
Scotus Erigena, for example — but led his age only as the 
exponent of his age, never as a pioneer. He was just the 
kind of man to reflect faithfully the traditions of the church 
in which he was born and bred. 

The value of establishing this point about the English 
Church is this, that it was characteristic of those who op- 
posed image-worship — both the fiercest iconoclasts, like 
Leo III, for example, and those who took a more moderate 
position, like Charlemagne — to make a great exception in 
favor of the cross. The cross was the only image — if so it 
may be called — to which adoration could properly be paid; 
and in condemning images, they laid special emphasis upon 
the cross. 

The latter part of the eighth and the beginning of the 
ninth centuries we have recognized as the period in Eng- 
land when there seemed to be a special impulse toward the 
honoring of the cross. This period was in the very heart 
of the iconoclastic war. The theory that this impulse was 
largely due to the attitude of England in the controversy, 
the quickening of a regard for the emblem which was 
already dear to the national heart by the story of Oswald, 
and already received ' adoration,' to the exclusion of every 
other object in the church, appears, on the whole, to be the 
most satisfactory in explaining the facts. 

Very likely, beneath the Elene, or the Dream of the Rood, 
there was a personal experience of some sort — a dream, 
for example — in which the cross figured. Yet it would be 
just this heightened interest in the cross which would ac- 
count for its being the centre of this religious experience in 
the mind of the poet, rather than the person of Christ, for 
example, or Mary, or one of the saints. 



Influence Abroad 97 

We may regard, then, this poetry of the cross in England 
as perhaps the first fruit of this impetus, giving to it, at 
the same time, added force by its own warmth, beauty, and 
sincerity. And it may not be too much to regard the appli- 
cation of the elaborate and minute traceries of Celtic orna- 
ment upon stone crosses as the first fruit of this impetus 
in Ireland, for probably the Irish church was at one with 
the other churches of the North in regard to the use of 
images. At all events, as soon as the Irish had developed 
this style of the cross, the Anglo-Saxons appropriated it 
for their own, erected it everywhere, and it became the 
most conspicuous feature of their national art. This im- 
pulse found expression, then, in the Old English cross- 
poetry, the Latin prose and verse of Alcuin, and in the 
interlaced crosses which came from Ireland. 

Finally, let us inquire if this feeling in Anglo-Saxon 
England had any influence upon the literature of her neigh- 
bors on the continent. 

* In the ninth century,' says Didron, ' the praises of the 
cross were sung as men sing those of a god or a hero, and 
Rhaban Maur, who was archbishop of Mayenne in 847, 
wrote a poem in honor of the cross.' ^ Rabanus Maurus 
was undoubtedly the greatest singer of the cross in the ninth 
century. His effort in verse, The Praises of the Cross, 
finished in 815, has been characterized as * a monument of 
misdirected zeal and patience.' In this he develops the 
cruciform acrostic to a point that is fairly appalling. How- 
ever, his work became very popular, and was admired as a 
miracle of ingenuity. It seems to be this, especially, that 
Didron has in mind. 

But the exaltation of the cross ' as a god or a hero ' is 
precisely what we have noted among the Anglo-Saxons. 
The second book of Rabanus' praises of the cross is an 
explanation in prose of the figure in his acrostic. The last 

* I, 371-2. 



98 Influence Abroad 

chapter deals with the last figure, representing a monk 
adoring a cross, and concludes thus : 

O crux alma Dei, usque hue, quantum potui, laudem tuam cecini ; 
sed quia triumphum perpetem expetis, quem in his mortalibus 
pleniter et perfecte non invenis, confer te ad caelestia angelorum 
agmina, ibique tibi laus perpetus per cuncta sonabit saecula/ 

This is the tone of the Dream of the Rood. It would be 
interesting to trace a connection between these ideas of 
Rabanus and the cross-poetry of the Anglo-Saxons. Alcuin 
was called to the court of Charlemagne in the year 752, and 
from that time his career is chiefly bound up with the 
empire of Charlemagne. His best work, undoubtedly, was 
in education; and to his school at Tours were sent young 
men of promise from all parts of the realm. One of these 
was Rabanus Maurus, and between this brilliant student 
and his master there developed a warm and lasting friend- 
ship. Naturally in such relations of friend and pupil one 
would expect that Rabanus would become throughly imbued 
with the traditions of the Church of England. But further 
than this, we find that the very poem under discussion was 
written by Rabanus at the suggestion of Alcuin.'' 

With this the connection becomes complete. But, unfor- 
tunately, the love of the cross in Alcuin found its expres- 
sion chiefly in the self-imposed penance of the acrostic. 
And this was the model that the master set before his pupil, 
rather than the Elene or the Dream of the Rood. So it was 
the love of the cross in its scholastic habit that aflfected 
Rabanus, and inspired his De Laudibus Sanctce Crucis. 

While Rabanus is by far the most important singer of the 
cross of this period in the Prankish empire, two others may 
be noticed : Johannes Scotus Erigena, and Otfrid, the 
author of the Evangelienbuch. 

The former was an eccentric Irish scholar who went to 
France about the year 843. Among his writings is a poem 
to the cross of seventy lines. This has many traces of the 

^ I, 294. ^ Schaff 4. 727. 



Conclusion 99 

mysticism of Alcuin, and has also a fine enthusiasm for 
the cross, which, if he did not get it from Alcuin, he had 
probably caught in his own country or in England. 

The latter, Otfrid, made a rimed paraphrase of the Gos- 
pel narrative in the German tongue. In the fifth book 
of his work, the first three chapters have to do with the 
cross. These are full of the mystical interpretations of 
Alcuin, the meaning of the ' heighth and depth,' etc., and 
the significance of the parts of the cross embracing all the 
regions of the world. To trace the connection still more 
clearly to Alcuin, Otfrid was a pupil of Rabanus. 

In Chapter 20 of the Evangelienhuch, Otfrid describes 
the Day of Judgment. It would be most interesting if we 
could discover in this any trace of the Christ. The speech 
of Christ in Otfrid reminds one of the speech of Christ in 
Cynewulf, but it must be admitted that they are no more 
similar than would be expected from the fact that both 
writers used the Gospel narrative. Further, Otfrid omits 
wholly the most striking feature of the description in the 
Christ, namely, the Apparition of the Rood, a fact that 
makes it seem clear that the Christ was not one of his 
sources. 

We must conclude, then, that the ninth century cross- 
poetry of England and Germany was inspired largely by the 
reverence for the cross in Anglo-Saxon England, through 
the medium, not of the Old English poetry, but of the Latin 
scholasticism of Alcuin. 



L.ofC. 



100 The Cross in the Life and 



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Introd. notes, etc., 1899. 
Wulfstans Homilies., ed. A. Napier. Weimar, 1882. 



Otfrid. Otfrids Evangelienbuch, ed. Paul Piper. Paderborn, 1878. 
Tupper, Frederick. 'The Anglo-Saxon Daegmael,' Pub. Mod. Lang. 
Assoc. 10. Baltimore, 1895. 



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